El Carbonero

I ordered the "3 pupusa combo".. & while eating my rice I see a random piece of CHICKEN SKIN, & a strand of HAIR! The beans were watered down, & the pupusas sucked.

This is the most nastiest place to eat don't walk by Run to find a strain of hair in your food is just horrible and they will not make anything up please do not eat at this place so nothing but filth and discuss and the and they really think they serve good food just finding a nasty piece of hair in your food can make you just throw up so don't walk by run when you see this place real talk

I was visiting Phoenix for a conference and taking a tour of the area around GCU with my friend. Drove past this place and saw it was El Salvadoran and made my friend take us here for dinner. I love pupusas, who doesn't? Anyway the outside of the store isn't gorgeous but they've done a good job inside making it neat, clean, and cheerful. I wanted everything but got 3 pupusas: jalapeno, pork and beans, and chicken. My friend got shrimp and pork I think. We also had huge glasses of tamarind drink. I was going to order horchata but the waitress mentioned that El Salvadoran horchata is different and made from 'seeds' and she let me try a sip of it from a sauce cup. Definitely not the rice and cinnamon Mexican horchata but not bad, just thicker and different. I stuck with tamarind though and it was delicious and a massive cup. We actually ordered more than what we received which is why I take away a star. We came in when one person was inside and soon after the place was full, so I get forgetting our tamales -- also, if we had received them we wouldn't have been able to eat them, I was stuffed. However I would have liked to try them and an order of plantains. This is an excellent place for a cheap quick lunch or dinner that will be delicious and fill you up. Pupusas are $2 each and I couldn't finish 3.

Best place ever!! Love the food here and they have the best customer service which is a big plus. I live about 35min away but I don't mind driving that far for some good pupusas at all

These are the best papusas I've had so far in town. Wednesday and Saturday they're only $1.50 each. We always buy 20 and their cabbage it get's served with is amazing. The staff is friendly and the food is much better than El Salvadoreno. The building however is very old and just due to it's age, looks dirty. I wish they would move to a cleaner looking building or completely remodel the walls and floors inside. Other than that I would have given it 5 stars just based on the quality of the Papusas.

Came here with a friend bc she had a restaurants.com certificate. I'm so glad she did. We found a gem in discovering this hole-in-the-wall. At first glance of the menu, we thought we'd have a hard time reaching our minimum of $22.50 for $15 off. The pupusas and tamales were $2 each. By the time we were done ordering and got the bill, we had overdone it and had a bill close to $30. Thank goodness for the coupon. All worth it though and we wouldn't have tried all the dif. things if we limited ourselves! Seeing as how my friend is Salvadoran, I knew her approval was the icing on the cake.We ordered the following:1) Chicharron con queso pupusa con harina de arroz.The dough of this pork pupusa was made from a rice instead. It was a little firmer texture than the standard pupusa. Pretty good. I prefer it softer but still yummy2) Calabaza con queso pupusaShredded zucchini and cheese. Couldn't really taste the zucchini as it was vey mild but good for those of you who want green veggies :). 3) tamale de pollo - my favorite!!! Salvadoran tamales aren't like Mexican tamales. The masa is much softer, moister and smoother (not as grainy). It came with meat and a small piece of potato. Not sure how much they cost here but back home I've paid $3-$5 for them and this one was certainly the best one. The masa was so well flavored and at $1.80 ea, it is well worth it. 4) Camarones de mojo al ajo-garlic shrimpDefinitely garlicky. You get a small bowl of shrimp in garlic sauce with 2 plain pupusas, beans, rice and salad. The shrimp was a bit too firm for our liking. But the sauce was good.5) Horchata SalvadorenaThis horchata is made from a seed called moro instead of using rice. It was nuttier and almost smoky tasting. It wasn't sweet at all but apparently it can sometimes be. My friend gave it a thumbs up. I thought it was a good change from the Mexican horchata but it's not for everyone. The waitress was really sweet and let us try a sample first. 6) Nuegados de yuca - friend yuca with sweet custard inside. At this point I am hitting my limit of being overly stuffed with carbs. Heck, I don't even know if I got the spanish name right b/c I am so full. It wasn't as "custardy" as my friend is used to. It was a bit firmer but you can't beat fried yuca with something sweet inside. It wasn't overly sweet.7) Empanadas de platano (?) dessert - it was fried plantain with something inside I think and with a brown syrup to dip. As the first one to review this place, I say go go go to this great little place. They have specials on pupusas on Weds and Sats. If you're driving and you're going west on Indian School, there is a good chance you might drive by it. It's next to a tax service and a discount liquor store or something (it was dark). If you go east, you can see the name on the side of the building.

Lovely service and good food !! Wish i knew about this place sooner! Love that Phoenix has a good share of Salvadorian restaurants. Old building and next to liquor store so not nicest outside but it's good inside.

They must've been good 2 years ago since all the reviews are 5 stars from way back then. Not good anymore. Ordered pupusas for the family and they were flavorless and bland. More dough than anything else in the pupusa. The pics looked super cheesy and full of goodness but that was not the case. Also the toppings that go on top of the pupusas were flavorless. Plus they made us pay for asking for some more of one of the toppings since we ordered a bunch of pupusas and they only gave us one small container for all of them. We also ordered empanadas de plátano stuffed with dulce de leche and they gave us the wrong ones. Safe to say we will not be back here again.

Terrible service this place definitely has gone down over the years there was no one inside we sat down ordered and a few minutes later a group of men came in and were immediately given chips and salsa and their food came out before us we had to get up and leave because the we were there almost an hour and never got anything very disappointed with the service

LOVED my zero-waste experience at El Carbonero. I've been sticking to only eating vegetarian when i eat out and they had delicious vegetarian pupusas. The complimentary salsa, chips, and slaw all came in dishes and so did the pupusas!Styrofoam+plastic- NONE with pupusas orderStraws- they'll drop off wrapped straws giving you the option to use them or not