Inka Chicken in Bridgeton

Beacon (00:00.046)
What are you doing back there? certainly, I'm cooking chicken. What type of chicken is that? This is pollo a la brasa. It's a rotisserie chicken made with chungo.

Beacon (00:18.892)
Hi, I'm Catherine Hardy. I'm here as your guest host for the Bridgeton Beacon. We're here with Hector Bonilla. He's the owner of the Mexico Travel Agency and also Inka Chicken. Hi, Hector. Thank you so much for taking time out of your day. So can we talk about the Inka Chicken menu and your restaurant? Okay, so the Inca Chicken menu is based on a little bit of Peruvian dishes.

And now we're incorporating Colombian dishes too. Wow. So eventually when we move, when we open the front here, we're going to be doing breakfast also. besides those two plates, we also have some Spanish plates also, like the Spanish fries, the tostones, maduros. My favorite is the rice that it looks like it has lentils in.

This all rice and beans. That would be a Puerto Rican rice Spanish rice. I love that. That is so good. That is so good. And you and you do the chicken yourself every morning. Yes. Every morning we fire up the charcoal and we put in the fresh chicken in. That's wonderful. That's wonderful. And then what what inspired you? I know you had said the building came up for offer, but what inspired you to open a restaurant other?

So I was I had before that I had three years in Bridgeton working in Bridgeton and I noticed that you only had two places to eat it was either fast food or Mexican food. I said there needs to be something different. So I decided Peruvian chicken, which is totally different. There's nothing around here. The closest one is in Pleasantville. And we're so happy to have you here. I mean, it's just wonderful. This is great. And,

And I can see one thing that I think we're going to get special photos of is most of the renovations inside this room you've done yourself. Yeah. And including, can you talk about the finish on this bar? So when I was doing the bar, I looked at different designs. I could even go with granite. I could either go with tile. They also use tile. But then

Beacon (02:39.008)
I decided to do the, this is actually hardwood flooring and then on top of the flooring we put in the finish which is like a hard coat clear finish. So it really, you can mess it up, can spill anything on it, it's really waterproof. I love that you're a decent

glitter that's I love yeah, we mix the glue with the some glitter and then once you put it on it becomes like it's really amazing. It's really amazing. And so over the years have you gotten a big following with the restaurant and the travel agency? Yeah, the well the travel agency does a lot of wire transfers. So we do, you know, like, Western Union moneygram. So we do get a lot of that clientele, which sends money away, then the

tie and tell here once we've been getting a lot of people because we can bring in live bands, we're bringing in DJ music. So the music side of it is another, it's a new audition that we're doing that is bringing a lot more people. It's wonderful. So are you, is this open, this side open regularly now? Not yet, only for events. Got it. But once it's finished, because it's not completely done, the bar is not completely finished.

then it will be open completely. This will be the main room and the back will be just a special event. Okay, I see. That's wonderful. That's wonderful. And so is there was there reason you chose Bridgeton to start or was just the opportunity? Actually, was just the opportunity. Somebody called me and said that was from Bridgeton and told me I have a business. I want to retire. Do you want it? Yes or not? And I took the chance. That's wonderful. That's wonderful. And you were born in Puerto Rico. You moved here when you were 14. Correct.

Yes, I was born there. I was moved. I didn't move. I didn't have any choice in the matter when I was a kid. So yeah, I moved to... First I went to Newark, New Jersey. Okay. And then from there we moved to violin and I stay there ever since. Do you go back to Puerto Rico? No, I have family there, but my immediate family is mostly here and in Florida. Got it. Wonderful. Wonderful.

Beacon (05:01.006)
And so I'm reading that prior to opening these businesses, you didn't have any any experience in either travel or I never had a business. The only business I had before was construction business. That's why I have this whole and that's why I was able to do all this. But in 2008, when they had the crash, the housing crash, I had to go back in to look for a job. And that's why I stopped that. Wow. Well, I mean,

It's we are so blessed to have you and no wonder this all this area looks so great with your construction background That's really wonderful. Yes. It sounds like you're really busy today and thank you so much. No, bro I was right now I from 11 to 8 but when we open up in the front, it's gonna be from 7 to 9 you had the Travel company before this before the restaurant I had Yes, that's correct. I started with the travel company

got it and the travel company was successful enough that you felt a restaurant should come? Actually what happened was I was given the option to look at this building. The first I looked at this building they said you want to buy the building and I told them well let me look at it first because I just purchased the building for the travel agency. So you have a building for the travel business and that's in it.

You don't rent that. No, I don't rent that. I don't rent any other buildings. Got it. A decent investment in downtown. That's wonderful. I bought this building, which included also the theater. Yes. So that's another project I'm going to be doing eventually in a couple of years. Do you know, can you share with us or is it a secret? It's going to be something like the district of Millville. You know how they have the art district building?

Yes something similar it's gonna have different shops inside I know exactly where you're talking like a little shopping center and then the second floor is gonna be something else which I'm not gonna devote yet Tommy yeah we're so lucky to have you in our community so it was so interesting to to find out that you graduated from Vineland High School yes 1985 like in 85 yes I graduated 1986 really yeah

Beacon (07:21.022)
No, no from Bridgeton but it's a wonder we didn't cross paths sooner. I never crossed the bridge from before. All right. I'll see you when you come back. I'll be back. Thank you.