Step onto Broadway in downtown Chelsea and you're in the middle of one of the most concentrated Latin American food scenes in Greater Boston — a stretch where Salvadoran, Honduran, and Mexican kitchens sit blocks apart, serving a city that's more than 60% Latino. Curly's Restaurant, open daily from 9 a.m. to 10 p.m. at 150 Broadway, has been part of that mix for years.

The menu leans into its Salvadoran roots — handmade pupusas, crispy yuca frita, tamales, and empanadas — while also stretching into carne asada, hearty soups, and even American diner staples like burgers and BLTs. It's a combination that could feel scattered elsewhere, but at Curly's it reads as a restaurant built for its actual neighbors: one table ordering pupusas, another ordering a chicken cutlet, both feeling equally at home.

Regulars keep coming back for the same things: the pupusas, the generous Salvadoran-style breakfast plates loaded with eggs, rice, beans, and hand-made tortillas, and portions substantial enough to become two meals. Reviewers consistently point to friendly service and a cozy, unpretentious dining room as much as the food itself.

Curly's isn't dressed up as a destination restaurant, and it doesn't need to be. It's a neighborhood spot doing what so many of Chelsea's family-run kitchens do — keeping a culture's flavors alive for the people who grew up on them, and introducing them to everyone else.

Curly's Restaurant is located at 150 Broadway, Chelsea, MA 02150, and can be reached at (617) 889-5710.