El Coyote Mexican Cafe has been serving up old school Mexican food to the Los Angeles area for 83 years. Currently located on 7312 Beverly Blvd., the restaurant building, signage and interior feel historic and festively fun. The walls are saturated with paintings, photographs and lights and bright parrot statues watch over you as you eat. The vintage Mexican decor is complimented by the waitstaff, who don colorful traditional Mexican dress. Oh, and the food ain't bad either!

We must say that we much prefer the food at El Compadre, but that doesn't mean we did not enjoy our lunch at El Coyote. We thought it was delicious, hot and fresh and we would come back in a heart beat.

The complimentary chips and salsa were solid, but we had way better chips and salsa at other Mexican restaurants in the area - El Compadre being one of them. We started off with the Jalapeño Poppers which were served on a bed of shredded lettuce and with a tangy creamy Italian or ranch type dipping sauce. They were nothing special and if anything tasted like something you could buy in the freezer section of the grocery store. But they were good nonetheless.  For our main entree we opted for a combination plate with the Cheese Enchilada, cheesy refried beans and rice and a Ground Beef Taco. We also ordered a side of flour tortillas to eat with the beans (not pictured). The Cheese Enchilada with rice and beans was very good and in a way it reminded us of a homemade version of an old school Mexican TV dinner -- it's what those frozen meals strived to emulate. The flour tortillas tasted handmade and were soft, warm and chewy. The Ground Beef Taco consisted of a freshly fried corn tortilla shell and was stuffed generously with seasoned ground beef, shredded iceberg lettuce, tangy white cheese and salsa. We enjoyed it, although the beef could have been seasoned a bit more.

Overall, we loved our lunch at El Coyote and found it to be fun in a throwback kind of way.