La Sirena Clandestina Prepares To Up Its Empanada Output When Google Moves In

• Michael Gebert
• Meat and vegetable empanadas, La Sirena Clandestina

Fifty-two thousand empanadas. That’s La Sirena Clandestina general manager Joe DiTola’s estimate of how many empanadas the Fulton Market South American bar and restaurant has served since opening in late 2012, mainly because everybody who comes in orders an empanada or two—everybody. “When we first opened, every ticket said one meat and one vegetable empanada and ceviche, one meat and one vegetable empanada and ceviche,” DiTola says.

Lately there have been two extra hands in the kitchen—Mark Steuer, formerly of Carriage House, who’s joined Manion in his Viva La Rev restaurant group beginning with El Che Bar in the West Loop, and Bryce Caron, who has been both a pastry and savory chef at places like Blackbird and Graham Elliot, and most recently worked with Steuer at the Carriage House. Manion says, “Any time we have some down time, we start kicking ideas for new empanada flavors around. Because boredom is death.”