Often overlooked, the Ecuadorian food diaspora is raising its own profile

As an Ecuadorian writer who has consumed American food writing for years, it has always surprised me that Ecuador’s vibrant and textured cuisine has yet to have its moment in the spotlight. Dishes like green plantain empanadas filled with melty queso fresco and ceviche Jipijapa bathed in a silky peanut and citrus sauce are just sitting there, ready to go viral. But even as other Latin American cuisines have become popular in the United States, Ecuadorian food has remained consistently overlooked.

There have been important moments of recognition, especially around the turn of the century. Food critic Jonathan Gold explored the Ecuadorian llapingacho stands selling mashed potato fritters along Los Angeles’s Pico Boulevard for his restaurant column in LA Weekly, in which he often highlighted the underestimated kitchens of LA’s immigrant communities, in 1998. In Kitchen Confidential, Anthony Bourdain famously said that the sharpest line cooks in New York were Ecuadorians. Throughout the book, he praises their skill and work ethic while recalling his years as a chef at the French restaurant Les Halles. With the acknowledgment of two media heavyweights, you’d think the story would have continued to expand. But the truth is that Ecuadorian cuisine still doesn’t live on magazine covers—or even in the conversation.

Writer Nicholas Gill, whose newsletter, New Worlder, and reporting across major food publications have made him one of the sharper observers of the cuisines of the Americas, puts it plainly: “Ecuadorian cooks are the backbone of the American restaurant industry, but Ecuadorian food itself is missing in that scene. We are hoping this will change.”

The United States is home to the largest Ecuadorian community outside of Ecuador, some 830,000 people in total. This is more people than make up the Peruvian and Argentinian communities in the United States, but these countries’ cuisines have a far larger international footprint. Ecuadorians’ own food traditions have barely scratched the surface of American mainstream culture, yet this cuisine is incredibly diverse and full of personality, rooted in the food traditions of indigenous peoples from the Andes, the Amazon, and the Pacific Coast. The cuisine has been further shaped by Spanish colonization, enslaved Africans who were brought to Ecuador, and global trade with Asia and Europe.

The result is a deeply regional cuisine with enormous variety. On the Pacific coast of Ecuador, seafood, plantains, peanuts, and coconut are celebrated in abundance. Distinct styles of ceviche sit alongside aromatic coconut seafood stews and mashed fried green plantain balls with fresh cheese and chicharrón. In the Andes, pork, corn, and potatoes are king. Hornado, a whole roasted pig with a crackly skin, is served with creamy llapingachos, an orange tomato dressing, fried ripe plantains for sweetness, avocado slices and hominy to cleanse the palate, and a tamarillo-and-lupini-beans chile sauce for heat. “There isn’t one single dish yet that everyone thinks of, like Venezuelan arepas or Peruvian ceviche, but that isn’t necessarily a bad thing,” says Gill of the broader conversation around Ecuadorian cuisine in the United States. “The cuisine is so diverse, so particular, so regional, so specific to place that it’s hard to encapsulate.”

In the Amazon, the food is simpler but still delicious. River fish and yuca are often wrapped in banana leaves, grilled and served with chiles and native fruits and vegetables like garabato yuyo sprouts or grilled macambo seeds. This region is also the birthplace of cacao and is home to the greatest genetic diversity of cacao in the world, which has turned Ecuador into a global leader in fine chocolate .

Over the past five decades, Ecuadorians’ arrival in the United States has been driven by economic and political crisis, and more recently, rising insecurity for immigrants in the country. Many Ecuadorian communities are concentrated in the New York Tri-State area, while other new arrivals have settled in cities like Miami, Chicago, Los Angeles, Minneapolis, and Houston. Those who arrived undocumented survived by keeping their cultural expressions out of public view and assimilating into American life. At the same time, Ecuadorians became essential to the American workforce, especially in restaurant kitchens, food production, and agriculture.

“At work is where I’ve been able to connect with the Ecuadorian community in New York,” says chef Michelle Proaño, who works as a sous chef at the French restaurant Le Coucou and has previously worked in the kitchens at Café Carmellini, Chef’s Table at Brooklyn Fare, and Gabriel Kreuther. “There are just so many of us.”

While Ecuadorians have helped to literally feed America, their own cuisine has remained confined to their homes, close-knit community gatherings, and small restaurants or informal street food stands that mostly served other Ecuadorians. But lately a new generation of immigrants has begun to claim space more publicly through social media, restaurants, and cookbooks.

Kiera Wright-Ruiz is one of the few writers helping bring Ecuadorian cuisine to a broader American audience. In her 2025 cookbook, My (Half) Latinx Kitchen, she reflects on growing up Ecuadorian and Korean, exploring flavors passed down by her Ecuadorian grandfather. The book includes her take on iconic Ecuadorian dishes, like seco de pollo with naranjilla and beer, ceviche de camarón with lime, orange and ketchup, or her vegan guatita with a creamy peanut sauce and mushrooms. 

“Throughout my life in the United States, whenever I would tell someone I’m half Ecuadorian, the most common response was ‘What is that?’”, says Wright-Ruiz. That same question now shapes the work of Alejandra Espinoza, an Ecuadorian chef determined to bring her cuisine to a wider American audience. After opening her contemporary Ecuadorian restaurant Somos in Quito in 2019, Espinoza and her family moved to Miami in 2023. In less than three years, she opened two restaurants there: Cotoa, an Ecuadorian fine dining restaurant that is now Michelin , and Cotoita, a fast-casual concept. Espinoza is currently preparing to open an Ecuadorian bakery called Ishpingo and to expand Cotoa into a larger location.

At first, Espinoza says, there was little interest in her Miami restaurants because diners didn’t seem to know where Ecuador was located on the map or, more importantly, what style of food to expect. But over time, the cuisine’s distinct flavors set it apart. “Our food is very colorful, with flavors and textures that stand out from other cultures in Miami. When customers try it, they realize our cuisine is unique. It is not the same as Colombian, Peruvian, or Venezuelan food,” says Espinoza. “Now I have a diverse clientele from all nationalities. We bring all of Miami together.” With that base established, she’s encouraged to expand the menu into more unconventional territory. “Recently I made guinea pig dumplings, and I could do it because customers now understand us and give us a chance. They trust us after having tried simpler dishes first, like our Jipijapa peanut ceviche.”

Building a relationship with diners is key for other Ecuadorian restaurants trying to expand their customers beyond their existing community. Fernando Cando, chef and owner of Leticias in Corona, Queens, found an unexpected way in: tacos.

“There are many Ecuadorian restaurants in Queens, but they are very homestyle,” Cando says. “I saw an opportunity to present our food in a creative way and promote it, not only to Ecuadorians but also to an international audience. I created a section of the menu with tacos, which are friendly for foreigners and easy to eat, with fillings from Ecuadorian dishes like hornado, tripa mishqui, or guatita, introducing them as small bites instead of having people order a large main dish.” While Cando’s tacos aren’t among the most ordered items on his menu now, he believes they have helped engage with new customers. In 2022, restaurant critic Pete Wells visited Leticias, awarding it a critic’s pick in the New York Times, providing another boost.

For Ecuadorians in Queens, buying warm cups of morocho and empanadas from street vendors alongside weekend soccer and volley canchas remain essential ways of maintaining community. But as ICE’s mass deportation campaign deeply impacts the Ecuadorian diaspora in the United States, these practices are shifting. Sonia Guiñansaca, an Ecuadorian-born indigenous Kichwa-Kañari poet and cultural strategist, grew up in Harlem going to spaces like these to connect with their culture. “Now, in places that are really getting hit by ICE raids, there’s a fear of going out,” says Guiñansaca. “If you’re the owner of an Ecuadorian restaurant, [keeping it open] is hard. Three years ago, it was different. I’m sure people are trying their best to maintain their connection to their homeland through food, but [many of them are] staying inside, safe and protected from ICE.”

From working in the food industry as unseen labor to sharing their culture only within close community networks, there are plenty of reasons why Ecuadorians and their cuisine have remained underexposed in the United States. Even the role of a food media landscape that has historically favored only a narrow range of Latin American cuisines, along with limited efforts from the Ecuadorian government to promote the country’s culinary identity abroad, have reinforced this cuisine’s quiet presence.

Still, there are countless voices like Guiñansaca’s, Espinoza’s, Cando’s, and Wright-Ruiz’s. Across New York, Miami, and beyond, Ecuadorian writers, cooks, and families are building a culinary landscape of their own. Even far from the spotlight, Ecuadorian cuisine continues to be a place of joy, refuge, and resistance, and it’s becoming more visible as its people start to take control of its representation.

As Ecuadorian Americans step forward, the question is no longer whether the cuisine is worthy of attention. It is whether the rest of the world is ready to recognize what has been there all along.