Highlandtown's Chicken Rico gets mentioned a lot when the conversation turns to Baltimore's best chicken places. Briny, peppery Peruvian-style rotisserie chicken is the kind of food that creates strong feelings, and the relative merits of various joints are fiercely argued in other East Coast cities, where there's more competition - sometimes it comes down to which place has the best fried plantains or the best aji verde, that piquant pepper-and-cilantro condiment that diners drizzle over the chicken.
If Chicken Rico doesn't really have any competition in Baltimore, it could be because of how consistently good its food has been since its opening five years ago. Already, Chicken Rico feels like one of those perpetually busy places like Attman's Delicatessen or Faidley Seafood, places that earn loyal customers by serving them something reliable and good but never feel stale or institutional. What they share is the feeling that the people working there care.
A first visit to Chicken Rico can be bewildering, but the same could be said of Attman's and Faidley's. You'll find whatever language barrier you meet here to be negligible and easily negotiated, but the menus posted over and behind the ordering counter are confusing. And because things move fast here, placing an order quickly can feel like a matter of great urgency. So just order a chicken. A half a chicken, served with two sides, is more than I could finish, but then I had something left for lunch the next day.
It's the choosing of the sides that can rattle a person. So, just order the plantains and some fried rice. Or just point to something in one of the bins. Frankly, not all of the sides are spectacular - the corn on the cob is pasty, and yucca is too subtle for me - think of the sides as things to help you absorb some of the chicken's assertive vinegar and spice.
With your tray loaded up, you find an empty table, sit down, and do what everyone here does - rip into your chicken. I like eating here. The furnishings are very basic, and it can get very loud, especially when the room starts to fill up with families. But it's all smiles, and the continual sound of fresh-off-the-spit chickens being hacked into halves and quarters takes on a pleasing rhythm.
