Pupuseria Dona Carmen En Riverside

Finally an authentic Salvador hole in the wall experience available in the DFW. Don’t come here expecting an Americanized treatment complete with an English speaking staff with accents serving food and simultaneously dancing to salsa music. This restaurant stays true to its roots offering a plethora of authentic dishes and even a few Honduran favorites. The pupusa selection is pure and the prices are so low you’d might feel like you just robbed a sweet old Salva lady. Service is rapid, food is delicious, and credit cards are accepted. However, it receives 4 stars due to a lack of fresh cabbage.

I went in at noon and ordered. I sat down thinking it would take awhile, but it only took about 3 minutes. That was nice! However, that means I didn’t get to try to free aqua fresca, so maybe I will dine in next time. It is long table seating style, but there are a few different tables.
The pickled cabbage slaw was fresh and crunchy with the perfect amount of spicy! The red sauce tasted like ripe tomato. My pupusas were perfect!
I got pork and cheese. They were very flavorful and juicy. They are only $ 1 each, so I ordered 5… I meant to eat some now and some later… but. I … ate them all.
(2 or 3 would be a good lunch for most people)
Next time I am in the area I really want to try some platanos con crema and see how they do their tamales!

Only reason I come here is b/​c I live like 2 minutes away.
The pupusas are actually good but the customer service is crappy.
The waitresses/​staff aren’t so polite. its kind of like get what you want, ask for it and go.
but taste wise it is good here. I recommend ordering take out which is what I do b/​c they take FOREVER to make the food!
I went here with my family on a busy night, no joke, the food took 1 hour. it was ridiculous so now we do take out only. order it ahead and take it home to enjoy it best.

Very affordable… But taste like its off the hook, very authentic, met the owner, she was very hospitable and explained everything, I’ll be back

The place: kinda dirty inside. doesn’t look very up kept. there were long pinic tables everywhere, very old and dirty. On our table, it was still dirty with some coleslaw. I think we even tried to pick a clean table.
Service: only Spanish. I think you seat yourself. We stood at the door for a few minutes while a girl keep walking by with food. I know she was busy, but she didn’t even pause to direct us. Finally! some attention. told us to sit wherever. She never even gave us menus. We stared around a saw a menu board hanging on the wall. But then i noticed other tables were getting menus when they sat down. This is definitely not restaurant quality of any sort. Don’t expect attention or help. Almost seem like they don’t care. Just as long as you eat and pay. If we needed something, we had to wait patiently until someone came by and flag them down, cause they are NOT making eye contact with you to see if you need anything. In fact, it almost seems like they avoid looking at you as they walk hurriedly by. It could be we were the only non-​Hispanics there.
Ordered some pupusas. had some fried with jalapenos. It was ok… I didn’t get the super oozy, cheesy pupusas like I usually get. In fact, mine didn’t have a lot of oozing cheese. The weirdest thing was the coleslaw. I think that’s what they call the cabbage/​carrot stuff soaking in those plastic containers on the table. I’m used to it being brought out cold and fresh looking from the fridge along with my pupusas. The containers on the table were cloudy looking, dirty with dirty tongs on top of the jar for self-​help. The cabbage slaw juice was a very odd color. pinkish/​orangish. I’m used to seeing it in a more clear water type liquid, and not cloudy. This definitely did not look appetizing…
We ate our food and left unimpressed and disappointed our cravings weren’t satisfied. We will have to stop in the pupusaria in Arlington one day.

the food is good. the wait was soo long. honestly, probably won’t go back just because the wait didn’t justify the food. too bad…

This place is GREAT. Atmosphere-​wise, you kind of feel like you have accidentally walked into a party in someone’s family’s home, where they cleared out the living room and stuffed a bunch of long family style tables and everyone is just hanging out eating. That about sums up the atmosphere. There is no printed menu (not that I saw) but the staff are awesome and extremely friendly and helpful. My husband and I probably looked a little out of place when we walked in, and maybe a little confused because we weren’t quite sure where to go/​what to do, but a girl came over to us as soon as she wasn’t busy and asked us if we knew what we wanted. She was super kind and since we had no idea what was on the menu (besides pupusas, which is why we came) she kindly listed off everything for us and helped us with our order. We ordered a bunch of different kinds of pupusas (you have to have the ones with jalapenos cooked on/​in them) and set us up. Now the whole time everyone at the restaurant was going over to this enormous soup-​pot looking thing (I am not kidding that it was enormous. I think a large child could literally get in that pot it’s so huge) dishing out stuff from the pot into the cup. I first thought this was some sort of family style soup, but it turns out it was FREE agua fresca. Another one of the servers was super nice and pretty much yelled (see! family atmosphere y’all) at us to help ourselves to the fruit water. It was delicious and I’m hoping that they have that every time.
Anyway, This place is great. It feels like you are in another country and although I haven’t yet visited El Salvador I’m supposing it is very authentic. The pupusas are so yummy, they are huge, and I think they are like $ 1.25 each if I remember correctly. Go check it out!