Colorful Bus Brings Puerto Rican Street Food Staples To New Berlin

NEW BERLIN, WI — A school bus converted into an eatery is now serving up authentic Puerto Rican street food in New Berlin.

Luis Diaz built the bus and named it La Promesa shortly after he moved with his family from Puerto Rico to Wisconsin, he told Patch. Diaz found the vehicle for sale one day on Craigslist, and after building it out since 2021, Diaz opened the spot for business in May, he said.

You can find the bus parked at 21300 W. Greenfield Ave. in New Berlin from 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays. Diaz said he also planned on visiting festivals and food truck events in the future.

"Nobody has a food truck with tables inside and a kitchen," Diaz said. "So that was my goal, to surprise people, to make them to come and enjoy the food at the same time, and they can relax like a restaurant, but in a bus."

When Diaz first came to the Milwaukee area with his family, they found a lack of Puerto Rican food in the area. He tried things around the Milwaukee area, but it wasn't quite cutting it. So Diaz told his wife about the bus idea.

"We need to make this; we need to do it," Diaz said he told his wife. "Because I know people are going to come over. It doesn't matter if we are 15, 20 minutes away or 30, we're making this because they don't have nothing around."

La Promesa's menu is small, Diaz said. He made it simple as he hopes people will try more than one thing.

"I want people to know what we offer in Puerto Rico," Diaz said.

What To Try At La Promesa

For someone unacquainted with food from Puerto Rico, Diaz recommended trying a few things, but especially the carne frita con chimi y tostones, a dish consisting of soft, deep-fried chimi pork with fried flat plantains.

"The tostones with garlic butter," Diaz said. "Oh, man, it's another level."

Diaz also recommended the camarones shrimp, which are pan-fried garlic shrimp served in a white sauce with plantains, or street-food staples such as bacalaito or alcapurrios.

Bacalaito consists of battered and deep-fried cod fritters with traditional seasoning. Alacapurrios are a type of fritter as well — Diaz places ground beef into a dough made out of plantains and deep-fries it.

Another street-food recommendation from Diaz was the pinchos de pollo, a type of chicken kabob.

More information about La Promesa is available through its Facebook page.