Caveat to this review:we ate there Christmas Day about 7pm and knew that this place, as do many other restaurants open on this day, have a fixed or limited menu. Nothing at all wrong with that. I get it, Christmas is a day most want to be home relaxing with family and friends. I can also accept that these limited menus will be more expensive as I understand (or at least hope) that those willing to give up their holiday are paid extra. No problems with that thinking here. However, with these givens being laid out, I feel as though it is the restaurant's duty to hold up their end of the deal- if you open, and charge more on a holiday, bring your A game, and if you can't deliver it, please just take the day off!
We started with a 'gift from the kitchen' chayote squash soup. It was lovely. Next we had to share (as dictated on the menu, two people had to share one appetizer) the crab appetizer. I'm from the US gulf coast and can tell you that from bite one I could tell the crab had a hint of ammonia taste to it which is what you get when it spoils. There were some nice artichoke hearts with it. Then we both had tomato soup-no complaints there. For entrees we got the short ribs and French onion hamburger. The short ribs and pasta they came with were cooked pretty well, but there was enough salt in there to send someone into a flare of congestive heart failure. It was actually impossible to finish it was so salty. The burger was a mess, literally a decent hamburger that seemingly was doused in a (again) salty soupy substance that resembled French onion soup to the point that the act of picking up the bun and it not falling apart was out of the question.
Then there was dessert. Ah yes, dessert, which I cleared with the waitress in both English and Spanish was devoid of nuts given my wife's tree nut allergy. She assured me no nuts. Lo and behold, when the items came out the plate and ice cream that accompanied her chocolate cake had been dusted with small bits of almonds. I pointed this out to the waitress, who reassured me these were "just almonds, not nuts", so no worries. I assured her this was a problem and she seemed to get it, took the plate away to change it out. She reappeared with a new dessert after about thirty seconds, and it was obvious all that was done was that the nut bits that could be removed with a finger were removed. Plenty remained however. So needless to say, no dessert was eaten.
After all was said and done, two very small (2oz?) chayote squash soups, a borderline bad crab dish, two good tomato soups, a salt lick disguised as short ribs, a mess of a hamburger, one dessert, a cocktail, a tequila, a beer and glass of red wine came to over $4000 Mexican. That is over $200 US. Not good value at all, and the whole nut thing, Christmas or not, was inexcusable.
We like to come to Mexico for Christmas and have done so several years now. Next year I think we are just going to have to eat street food as these fixed holiday menus tend to disappoint, and this one was just bad. read more