Who seeks nuance in a side of rice and beans? Yet here it is at Lucky Luna, the rice faintly marine from an overnight soak and simmer in a broth of kombu and shiitake stems. The beans, too, are not the usual congealing muddle, but discrete drops of heirloom yellow-eyes, scented with coriander.

This is the moment when Lucky Luna, possibly the only Mexican-Taiwanese restaurant in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, makes good on its hyphenated premise. Elsewhere on the menu, the two cuisines are neighborly but distinct: posole here, congee there, chips and salsa next to bok choy. Boundaries are for the most part respected, perhaps too much.

But that bowl of rice and beans, against all odds, intrigues. It shows that Lucky Luna has more ambition and finesse than its underdressed dining room and low-key, snackish, $10-and-under menu might suggest.

The chef, Howard Jang, cooked at Daniel, part of an eclectic résumé that includes stints at Danji (where Hooni Kim, another Daniel alumnus, applies French technique to Korean fare) and Mission Chinese Food in New York (which — coincidence or zeitgeist? — now has a Mexican offshoot, Mission Cantina).