Chelito's Pupuseria
Central american, pupusa · Santa Cruz
About Chelito's Pupuseria
Chelito's Pupuseria in Santa Cruz offers a delicious and authentic dining experience. We specialize in pupusas, prepared with fresh ingredients and a variety of fillings, including vegetarian and vegan options. Customers rave about our flavorful burritos, especially the super shrimp burrito, and our...
Chelito's Pupuseria in Santa Cruz offers a delicious and authentic dining experience. We specialize in pupusas, prepared with fresh ingredients and a variety of fillings, including vegetarian and vegan options. Customers rave about our flavorful burritos, especially the super shrimp burrito, and our refreshing agua frescas. Our salsa bar and complimentary sides add to the experience. With fast, friendly service and a welcoming atmosphere, Chelito's is a local favorite for lunch and dinner. We offer dine-in, takeout, and delivery, with full wheelchair accessibility. Many customers appreciate our clean restaurant, ample parking, and convenient location.
What Customers Say About Chelito's Pupuseria
Chelito's Pupuseria is a local favorite known for its delicious and fresh pupusas, burritos, and aguas frescas. Customers rave about the friendly staff and generous portions. Some customers have experienced long wait times or slow service.
Popular Dishes
Best For
Tip: The pupusas are best eaten right away. The salsa bar is a plus.
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What to see nearby
Data from Wikidata
Explore the area around Chelito's Pupuseria
Chelito's Pupuseria is located in Santa Cruz, surrounded by cultural and historical points of interest. Here are some of the most notable places nearby.
Historical Heritage
- Veterans Memorial Building (A 557m) — historic building in Santa Cruz, California, United States Lugar inscrito en el Registro Nacional de Lugares Históricos
- Edificio Octágono (A 560m) — edificio histórico ubicado en Santa Cruz, California, EE-UU Lugar inscrito en el Registro Nacional de Lugares Históricos
- mission de santa cruz (A 794m) — mission in Santa Cruz, California Lugar inscrito en el Registro Nacional de Lugares Históricos
Museums
- Museum of Art and History (A 624m) — museum in Santa Cruz, California
Religious Buildings
- Holy Cross Church (A 836m) — church building in Santa Cruz, California
Parks & Gardens
- Eastside Park (A 538m) — park in Santa Cruz County, California, United States of America
- Santa Cruz Mission State Historic Park (A 655m) — park in the United States of America
- Grant Park (A 760m) — park in Santa Cruz County, California, United States of America
Other Points of Interest
- Hotel Paradox (A 188m) — hotel in Santa Cruz, California
- Santa Cruz Civic Auditorium (A 910m) — concert hall in Santa Cruz, California
Data from Wikidata
Frequently asked questions about Chelito's Pupuseria
Chelito's Pupuseria Santa Cruz Reviews
Amazing flavors! Best tamalaes and pupusas I’ve had. Salsa bar is delicious
After 4 years of searching I have found the best carnitas super burrito in Santa Cruz.
Awesome burritos, fast service, and yummy chips and salsa. 1000x better than the nearby Chipotle and so good rn. Yum yum in my tum
The food is so good so many people go there friendly staff they give free sides they have agua frescas too definitely recommend going with the family
We eat here when ever we go to Santa Cruz. We like the food, the place is clean and that there is parking. The food and agua fresca taste very fresh.
Amazing super shrimp burrito. The flavor was so good. The shrimp was cooked perfectly. delicious salsas. Chips were great. They had a great selection of aguas frescas and pupasas. They have vegetarian options and service is great. They have a small parking lot but we didn't have a problem parking. Highly recommend this place. I remembered to take a photo of the burrito when I was just about done. Whoops!
We were from out of town looking for yummy food. Thank goodness we found this place. Food was delicious and fresh. We ordered the pupusas with jalapeno cheese, zucchini cheese, chicharron and cheese, and a mixed vegetable they were all delicious and the employees were friendly. They offer indoor and outdoor dining but have NO bathrooms. We will definitely be back, next visit.
Many vegetarian and vegan options. I came for lunch on a weekday - not many people, most ordered to-go. Large TV had a soccer game on and pupusas are best eaten right away so I grabbed a seat. Ordered 2 vegetarian pupusas which are served with a mild red sauce and pickled cabbage. Pupusas are made fresh so they came piping hot and stayed pretty warm by the time I finished. There's a salsa bar towards the back wall, below the TV, unfortunately chips are not complimentary. I'd come back to try their burritos.
There's nothing wrong with it. The uniqueness of the pupusa wanes off as it's just a grilled cornmeal cake stuffed with basic meat and cheese. Feels like it needs more intense seasoning or sauces but maybe it's just how it is. The drinks are great, pineapple spinach, and a salsa bar that has some relative basics.
We waited for 30 min, everyone including people who were behind us got their food. Kept being told that cook was busy. We ended up leaving.
I want to make sure everyone knows first that we felt perfectly fine before eating. Ordered 2 cheesy jalapeno papusas, 2 breakfast burritos, 1 chorizo, 1 bacon (for the next morning because we heard they were fire), 1 chile relleno super burrito & 1 carne asada burrito. I took 3 bites of the chile relleno super burrito (which had no good flavor besides cold tomatoes, shredded lettuce and sour cream). Stopped eating. Started feeling sick as a dog. Packed up the rest of the burrito & put it in our cooler (just in case it turns out it wasnt the burrito). Wife said her carne asada burrito was ok. She tried a papusa- DELICIOUS!!! We ended up going to the free movie at the Santa Cruz Boardwalk, but instead of having fun I was sitting there feeling sick to my stomach worried I was going to be in the restroom all night. Thankfully, we made it back home, an hour and a half drive, safely. The next day, decided to toss the rest of that burrito. Warmed up half the (wrongly labeled) chorizo breakfast burrito. Warmed up the other breakfast burrito, bacon, and...it barely tasted like it had any bacon at all. Wife said the chorizo burrito was nothing great. Besides the food, the service was outstanding.
You can't trust this restaurant to serve you when you need it the most. Tonight Thursday July 24th, 2025 around 8:30pm after a long day of work my 2 coworkers and I were craving for some good pupusas and we decided to visit your restaurant. The lady working there named Rubi made us wait for more than 15 minutes and never took our order. She completely ignored us even though we made obvious and said we were ready to order. She just kept talking to the cooks in the kitchen. Paying customers should not be treated like this. I wonder if ordering over the phone is now the only option because she did gave service to a man who came after us and said he ordered over the phone. If this is the case maybe you should make a visible note on your website or at the entrance of the restaurant so next time we need to give you business we do it over the phone. Very bad customer service.
Out if all the Mexican restaurants/taquerias we have eaten this one ranks at the very low if my list, will not come back here. Does not taste good and they take long to deliver food, one plate at a time so dice of us in a table by the time they brought the third plate the first two persons had finish their food. 👎 Food not tasty, no flavor, chorizo tastes horrible, shrimp a la diabla the worse I've eaten🙈 lengua nachos we ask with no veggies but the lengua had no flavor, the other two meals were burritos but again mising flavor.
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About Chelito's Pupuseria
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107 Leonard St, Santa Cruz, CA 95060
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107 Leonard St, Santa Cruz, CA 95060
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