Chefs Ángel De Sousa, Ana Lobato and Felipe Salas are the international trio behind Quito-based restaurant Clara, named winner of the American Express One To Watch Award in the 2024 edition of Latin America’s 50 Best Restaurants. 50 Best discovers their winning dynamic
Three chefs: one Spanish, one Portuguese-Venezuelan, one Ecuadorean. What do they have in common? Clara, the Quito hot spot that has been named the American Express One To Watch in Latin America, ensuring significant attention not only from local, but also international diners and media.
Opened in December 2023 in the Floresta neighbourhood of Ecuador’s capital, Clara was an instant hit with locals, who keep coming back for the fun, relaxed atmosphere and unpretentious yet delicious menu. Adding to its charm is the fact the restaurant sits on a site with heaps of history: it started life as a coffee roastery before transforming into iconic bar El Pobre Diablo, which closed in 2017.
“Clara is an everyday spot,” says Felipe Salas. “We’re kind of obsessed with tradition, classic cuisine and everyday cooking. Clara is a bistro in the sense of how casual and accessible it is, and how we manage the menu with a la carte, specials and wine by the glass. We base our dishes on Ecuadorean produce and the nostalgia of popular cuisine, then we add our own twist.”
The pig's ear salad – inspired by the Ecuadorean classic, cevichocho – is a signature dish
A perfect example is its signature tomato and crunchy pig’s ear salad. Inspired by the classic cevichocho – an Ecuadorean street-food ceviche featuring tomatoes, lupini beans (a white bean) and pork scratchings – Clara’s version features a tiger’s milk base with heirloom tomatoes, lupini beans and a topping of crunchy pig’s ear. “It’s a nostalgic dish that people really identify with,” says Salas.
Next, there’s the omelette encocada, comprising sustainably fished langoustines in a coconut-based bisque made from super sweet, fresh coconuts from the Esmeralda region. “Encocado is a traditional coastal dish that’s usually made with seafood, like a curry,” says Salas. “It’s quite South Asian, with Afro-Ecuadorean influence too. We made our own version with an omelette.”
The power of three
A trio of chefs shouldn’t necessarily work, but it does. The most famous example is El Celler de Can Roca in Girona, twice voted The World’s Best Restaurant, where Ana Lobato worked for two years. “The three Roca brothers get on really well but they’re also very different from each other,” she says. “The number three is compatible because each has their own strengths.”
While some of the work is shared, they have distinct responsibilities: Salas is the head chef on savoury, while Lobato manages the dining room and wines, as well as collaborating with Ángel De Sousa on pastry. The latter puts his cacao expertise to work in a chocolate tart that’s always on the menu alongside a classic flan with Manabí vanilla and a rotating third dessert option.
De Sousa, Lobato and Salas came together to open Clara in 2023 gaining the love of the locals from day one
“The beautiful thing is the diversity of opinions,” says De Sousa. “We have three different filters. If one of us is having a difficult service one day, another will step in to help.”
Crossing continents
It’s a powerful relationship for a trio who only came together three years ago. Growing up in Ecuador, Salas spent 15 years working and studying in Australia, Denmark, Thailand and the US before returning home to open his restaurant, Banh Mi, among other enterprises.
In 2020, he joined Iche, a restaurant, school and laboratory focusing on young people from low-income backgrounds in Manabí on the country’s northwest coast. It’s a similar model to Gustu, the restaurant and school in Bolivia that until recently was led by Latin America’s Best Female Chef 2024, Marsia Taha.
De Sousa was born in Caracas to Portuguese and Venezuelan parents, growing up in Madeira before moving back to Venezuela as a teenager. He started cooking thanks to a teaching strike that suspended his sociology studies, and he ended up working at Alto, the restaurant run by inspirational chef Carlos García that has featured in Latin America’s 50 Best Restaurants.
He specialised in pastry and cacao, deepening his knowledge under Venezuelan chocolatier Maria Fernanda Di Giacobbe. After a long stint in Mexico City, De Sousa moved to Spain to work at Fundación Alícia, a culinary research centre near Barcelona.
The kitchen team draws fresh flavours from classic Ecuadorean products
It was at Fundación Alícia that De Sousa met Lobato, who had studied at the Basque Culinary Center and worked at several restaurants in San Sebastian, developing a passion for pastry and ice cream. The pair fell in love – then lockdown hit.
Culture shock
In 2021, Lobato and De Sousa received a call from Salas, who had heard of them through a mutual friend. Even though Lobato had never been to Latin America, she jumped at the chance to move, with De Sousa, to coastal Manabí. For two years at Iche, she worked as director of the innovation lab, while De Sousa was head chef of the restaurant.
“It was quite the culture shock going straight from Barcelona to a tiny fishing village on the Ecuadorean coast,” says Lobato, who grew up in Madrid. “Everything was different: the way people eat, the tiny restaurants, the markets, different rules.” But she quickly settled in, falling in love with the cuisine, culture and people.
“We arrived in Ecuador to work on a social project in an area that was heavily affected by an earthquake and where poverty is high,” says De Sousa. “We thought we were going to teach the basics of French cuisine, but it turned out that was the last thing they needed. Instead, we taught them about organisation, discipline and other values.” 
The restaurant has a laidback feel in the daytime and a more lively vibe during the evening
Lobato and De Sousa helped build a network of labs around Ecuador that allowed them to travel from the Andes to the coast to the Amazon, meeting producers and getting to know the local ingredients and biodiversity.
“Felipe’s project is cool because the students are young people with very few resources,” adds Lobato. “It was beautiful to use cooking to empower people and open doors for them.”
After two years at Iche, Salas asked if Lobato and De Sousa were interested in opening a restaurant with him. The answer was a resounding ‘yes’ – they were ready for a change, and happy to move to the capital. Within months, they had opened Clara, named after Salas’ mother. “We wanted a feminine name that was easy to explain,” says Salas, who also remains as executive chef at Iche.
Curating a vibe
There are perhaps three reasons why Clara works so well: one is the simplicity and accessibility of the menu, which encourages people to return. Another is the diversity of the space, which has different moods for different clienteles. In the daytime, Clara is filled with business diners and older customers who love the nostalgia of the food, while in the evenings, there’s a younger crowd who are excited to discover new flavours.
The third element is the playlist, lovingly curated by Salas and inspired by a trip to Blanca in New York City. “I loved the vinyl theme and wanted to do the same here, so it’s kind of a listening bar, too,” he says.
In the daytime, when the glass-walled restaurant is filled with light, the music is lowkey, while in the evenings, the volume goes up and the playlist could be anything from rock to reggae to indie.
Clara closes at weekends to help promote a better work-life balance for its staff
“We don’t take ourselves too seriously,” says Salas, who insists Clara is primarily about having a good time. This is reflected in Lobato’s young front-of-house team, who each have their own casual style, with no long-winded explanations of each dish.
Clara is closed on weekends – a decision for the benefit of the staff’s work-life balance, and to fill a Monday-shaped gap when other restaurants in the business district are closed. The team insists that locals will always be Clara’s priority, no matter how much attention this award may bring.
“I trained in various 50 Best restaurants, so it surprised me when we won this award,” says De Sousa. “We don’t have a tasting menu, it doesn’t cost $100 to eat here, it’s a place where people go to enjoy themselves. It’s cool that 50 Best is looking at that.”
Ultimately though, it’s obvious why Clara is worthy of being picked out as a rising star: it’s a place where people want to come back time after time – and surely that’s one definition of a great restaurant.
Now learn more about Clara in this video:
The list of Latin America’s 50 Best Restaurants 2024, sponsored by S.Pellegrino & Acqua Panna, will be announced on Tuesday 26 November from Rio de Janeiro. To stay up to date with the latest news, follow us on Instagram, Facebook, X and YouTube, and sign up to our newsletter.
