I went to Republica Empanada after researching local places. Their fig, mozzarella and dulce de leche empanada caught my eye so I grabbed my partner in crime and went for lunch on a Friday afternoon.
The place is tiny but very clean and nicely decorated. Not ideal with children. Inside it has one long table (bar) with bunch of chairs and about 8-10 small tables with 2-4 chairs each. They do have an outside seating area but I didn't go out. The place was rated A by health department as well.
I went just before noon and it was already busy. By the time 12:30 hit, it was packed. But they are very fast and lines moved quickly. The food didn't take long to come out and in the meantime, you get the enjoy the delicious smell.
We got 6 empanadas total. 4 meal and 2 sweet. We had the buffalo chicken, mushroom chicken, pernil, boricua, Ruiz's pieces and fig cheese & caramel. The savory ones were filled and generous. The pernil was tender and flavorful. The boricua is pernil with rice, peas, etc. and it had a tiny bit of spice and even better than the pernil. The buffalo chicken wasn't overpowering buffalo flavor and mushroom chicken was savory and moist with good spices.Ruiz's pieces was nutella and peanut butter. It was generously sprinkled with powder sugar and inside was warm and gooey. The star of the show for me was fig cheese and caramel. Dried fig with melted mozzarella and dulce de leche. What an interesting combination of flavors but it worked wonderfully together. It also came generously sprinkled with powder sugar.
It's a great local hole in the wall. We both loved everything about the place but the food is definitely worth the trip. It's a bit hidden but look for a red sign, it's hard to miss from the corner. Definitely a great find!