Vargas doesn’t have his name on the Niagara Street restaurant yet, but the sign on the sidewalk promises his entire menu.

It’s not easy to explain the allure of Senor Vargas to anyone who hasn’t been hankering for something a little different at lunch in downtown Buffalo.

Let’s say you have $5 and an hour for lunch. You could line up behind everyone else at the hot dog vendors, for your two wieners and a Coke.

Or you could slide over to Niagara Street and see what Puerto Rican soul food has to offer. Vargas, the master of roast pork Puerto Rican style, is operating out of a former coffee shop on Niagara Street, on the block north of Hudson Street.

Vargas lays in a strip of crispy pork skin among the tender meat.

But just because your $5 will go further there doesn’t mean it’s for everybody. Vargas’s place is halfway to anarchy when there’s any sort of rush on the little kitchen. If you don’t speak Spanish or keep an eye on what’s going on behind the counter, you might find your order a while in coming.

If you’re in the mood to sit down and relax and have a server take care of you, I would not recommend Vargas.

An order of soft, sweetly caramelized plantains out of the glass takeout case makes a fine partner with the roast pork.

But I keep going back - this is the third storefront in a decade in which I have beseeched Senor Vargas to make me a sandwich - because the man makes a killer Puerto Rican roast pork sandwich, called pernil.

Ask him for a pernil sandwich, and he slices a loaf of bread lengthwise, opens his pizza oven, and slides on the tray of pork legs he’s been roasting since the wee hours. He’ll choose a dose of meat for the bread, ladle on a bit of juice, and top the sandwich with a strip of crispy pork skin.

His rice is savory, his beans earthy. Then there’s the assorted fried treats you’ll see in the glass takeout case on the counter. One of my favorites is this snowball of mashed potatoes that’s been stuffed with seasoned ground beef and deep-fried. Terrific.

There’s another particularly good handheld fried treat, a hockey-puck shaped snack encircled with plantain, bordered with potato slices, and packing another payload of seasoned meat.

Whatever the reason, you might find a Puerto Rican interlude just the thing to shake up the lunchtime doldrums. If Vargas’ disorganized storefront is too much for you, head north a couple of blocks and settle in at the Niagara Cafe, if you can find a table.

Order the roast pork lunch of the chicken stew if you like, but don’t bother with the pernil sandwich there. Vargas is back.

Vargas’ roast pork is good enough to make the lack of service bearable.

Filed under: Buffalo, Restaurants