Sarah S.
Yelp
I'm sorry to report that this was one of the most disappointing meals I have ordered (and did not finish) in ages. As we entered (a Saturday afternoon), there were only two tables seated--the place was empty--and yet as we were seating, I saw that two other empty tables were still dirty; they had been bussed, but there was still food residue on the tables.
It took about five to seven minutes for the server to bring us water--and, again, the place was empty--and she then quickly departed. The server asked if we wanted drinks, and but there was no beer or wine list, and so no way of figuring out what they actually had. It was all so odd.
We ordered chips and guacamole, flautas de papas (sic), and a shrimp tostada.
The guacamole was Ok; the chips were fine... but they had not been salted prior to being brought to the table, so although salt was placed on them between the kitchen and us, it all fell off as soon as you picked up a chip. It was bizarre.
The flautas de papas should have been "flautas de papa," and the repeated errors in Spanish on the menu should have been a tipoff ("grilled asada," for instance--*asada* means "roasted," so this was "grilled roasted taco"). The flautas de papa were appallingly bad. Advertised as "roasted potato, serrano peppers, asadero / cotijo cheeses, shredded lettuce, salsa verde, crema.
These were horrible. The potato was mashed (which is fine--that's the proper recipe), not roasted. There was legitimately no heat at all, so I don't know what happened with the serrano peppers. The lettuce was soggy and weirdly stringy--I put some on my plate, took a bite, and then removed it all, because I was a little worried about food poisoning risks. The salsa verde had apparently been mixed with the crema, so it all resembled a weird low-end guacamole, and had no flavor. I tried to eat one flauta, but stopped, because it was so awful, and completely flavorless.
As I was trying to chew on a bite of the flauta and figure out what the heck was going, the server appeared, and said "Is everything tasting good so far?"; we were only 30 seconds into the meal, and both my partner and I had our mouths full. He quickly swallowed, and said "it's fine." I was still chewing, and so said nothing. The server stood there smiling down at me, and would not leave the table. I finally covered my mouth, and said "I am sorry, but I have food in my mouth," and she said "Well, I'll take that as a YES!" and walked off.
Friends: it was not a "yes."
The shrimp tostada was similarly confusing. It is advertised as consisting of "grilled blue shrimp, poblano-coconut slaw, cilantro, habañero" (actually, they write "habanero," but the Spanish chops on this place are clearly lacking).
The shrimp part was fine--they were done well. There was no poblano-coconut slaw: it was cabbage and--I kid you not--kale. There were radishes (fine--not listed, but fine). There was cilantro. If there was any habañero in that, it was not rearing its head. There appeared to be some of the weird salsa verde / crema thing added in. The tostada was basically impossible to cut. It was all a hot mess.
We called for the check--with about 1/3 of our dishes eaten--and it took a while, but we finally got it. I was a *little* surprised that the server didn't ask if anything had been wrong (because almost everything had been wrong), but she didn't.
We paid, we tipped well (as always), we'll never be back. On the good news end of it: it's more than six hours later, and I show no signs of food poisoning!
But don't go here. It's really awful.
