Lebanon couple brings Dominican street food scene to South 8th Street as Bytes

Bytes Dominican Flavors at 27 S. 8th St. in Lebanon, open late and offering classic Dominican street food, recently passed its one-year anniversary in the storefront.

They’re open from 3 p.m. to midnight on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays, and from 3 p.m. to 2 a.m. the next day on Fridays and Saturdays.

The menu has street food like chimi, burritos, tacos, mofongo, yaroa, patacon, cachapa, and more.

Married couple Junior and Lia Peralta run the business. They’re both from the Dominican Republic and moved to the United States. Junior said they’ve lived in Florida, New York, and now Lebanon, and they saw an opportunity to bring Dominican street food to the area.

“My father used to own a restaurant, we had a pizza shop, so I thought of owning a pizza shop, but when I went to Lebanon, there’s a pizza shop on every corner, so I thought this is not the business for Lebanon,” Junior said.

Before the storefront opened, they ran a home catering business where everything was bite-sized Dominican finger food. He said Dominican street food is very popular in New York, but there wasn’t anything local offering something similar.

“[Lia’s] cousin who brought us over to Lebanon, he was like, ‘Listen, there’s something missing in Lebanon that is food — street food,’” Junior said. “It was something different.”

He said they had people request certain food items from them, so they went to Dollar Tree, got aluminum containers, and started cooking.

And people liked it.

He said they were regularly waking up at 2 a.m. to cook and then take the food to their day jobs to sell to colleagues.

Then the space on South 8th Street opened. The previous owner was a client of the previous home-based business, and when he decided to sell the storefront, he offered it to Junior, who said he got some advice from the inspector when they came to check out the kitchen.

“He said something that happens with most Hispanic restaurants — they don’t welcome non-Hispanics. They’re just closed, dark, we’re always shaded, we’re always tinted,” Junior said. “We welcome everyone. They are our friends from day one, and they keep coming back for that.”

He said they haven’t done much advertising, and their customers either came from the catering business or tried the place after hearing positive reviews from other people.

Bytes recently got onto DoorDash, so customers can order from the restaurant and have food delivered. Junior said they’ve had some complaints about the independent drivers, but the new service has been great for business. They’ve seen orders from all over the county, up north from Jonestown and west from Palmyra.

Since they’re open late at night, Junior said they have customers stop in for some food before going out on the town. With DoorDash also being an option, the street food is easily accessible for Lebanon County’s night owls.

Beyond the personable customer service, Junior said the food is what keeps people coming back. The ingredients are high-quality, and they get meat delivered every other day to ensure it’s fresh.

And Bytes might be expanding into new regions in the future. They’ve had customers from Lancaster and Reading come in and express interest in a restaurant closer to their home, and Junior said they have close friends who might be interested in running a Bytes of their own.