a restaurant review!

  El Tapatio 10 N.E. Tenney Rd., Ste. 105 The story of a happy discovery.

After a day of running errands, my fiance having been ever-so-patient with me despite her feeling a bit under the weather, I decided she needed a night out of the house. We had originally planned to go to a favorite restaurant of ours and then to a movie, but found ourselves in the Salmon Creek area on Tenney road exchanging a defective game for another copy at the Gamestop there. We left, on our way to have a date and she saw the sign along the strip mall. 

There is no denying that this is a full service restaurant in a small square footage space, and so there is a bit of kitchen noise – at least from where we were sat. But as far as atmosphere – they did the best with what they had and really you can’t fault them for that. The service was friendly; everyone from the hostess to the waiter to the bussers were – or seemed – happy to see us there. 

The chips were freshly baked and the salsa was, in my opinion, one of the best in-house salsas I’ve had. Some would say it wasn’t chunky enough, but I personally like having sauce over hunks of "stuff." If you love super chunky salsa, then this will be a bit of a let down for you. 

The server was friendly and helped us both decide on what we wanted, giving honest opinions about things on the menu. She got the enchilada plate and I got a carne asada burrito. When the food came – which took all of 10 minutes maybe – the portions were huge. Her enchilada plate had three good sized enchiladas with big servings of rice and beans, and my burrito was bursting with steak, smothered in cheese, and also had big portions of the sides. The food was really good. The beans tasted fresh, the rice was not undercooked, and the steak in my burrito was very tender. It had a small hint of the gas-grilly taste, but that didn’t detract much from it. Her enchiladas were excellent as well, the sauce thick enough to not be runny and the ground beef well seasoned. 

After we finished – and had to get boxes – the staff didn’t seem to have that "rush them out the door" feeling, and we even got refills of chips, salsa, and drinks with boxes and check on the table. All in all I spent about 25 bucks there, and I had a really good time. So, if you’re ever in the area and have a desire for good Mexican food, I highly recommend El Tapatio’s.