Tikal Restaurant resides in the oft ignored Los Angeles neighborhood of El Sereno. Longtime friends Darwin Amador and Mario Granados avoid canned and frozen foods at all costs and specialize in dishes from Cocina Maya, the Mayan Kitchen.

Most wooden tables at Tikal Restaurant host a popular Guatemalan starter: Garnachas (3 for $5). The “semi-fried” tortillas, similar to Mexican sopes, are crispy at the base and supple in the middle, topped with beef, a pickled mince of cabbage and carrots, tangy tomato sauce, sprinkled cheese and parsley. This would have been a tasty snack, but what really took the garnachas up a rung on the flavor ladder was the spicy, tangy salsa that combined green chiltepin chiles with vinegar and parsley. Excellent.