Smoked Citrus Chicken
JUAN FRANCISCO “PANCHO” Ochoa’s life changed when he chose chicken over shoes. In 1975, he walked away from the shoe business and started selling grilled chicken, using his family’s recipe, out of what had been his shoe store in the city of Guasave on Mexico’s west coast. On his first day of business, Ochoa sold all 43 chickens he had grilled. He didn’t know it at the time, but this was the start of something bigger: El Pollo Loco.
Over the past 47 years, the fast food chain has grown to 485 locations in both Mexico and the United States; the
