Monterrey Mexican Grill
Posted on June 29, 2008 by Ching under Food and Drink.
Brian was feeling generous after his magnificent poker win so we decided to take his mom and dad out to dinner and a movie. The movie we had planned on in advance, but they originally had dinner plans with Bill and Lisa. Their plans fell through, so we figured the four of us could have dinner instead.
Since we invited them to dinner, we had them pick the restaurant. They picked Monterrey. We had never been there before so I figured it would be a good time to try it. Never again. We are going to pick the restaurants from now on. =P
We live on the Northeast side of town so we always drive by it, going to and from various places. We’d always wondered what the food was like, but never ventured in. I guess our instincts were correct.
Monterrey has got to be the most insignificant restaurant that has ever opened. Seriously. Notice how there are no pictures of food above. That’s because the food wasn’t picture worthy.
Here’s the quick and dirty. Though they weren’t really busy, the service was slow. The food was so-so. Chips were a 2 on a scale of 1 to 10. Abuelo’s chips tips the scale. They have the best chips in town. Chili’s chips are good, too. Heck, Felipe’s has better chips. Salsa was average. They really needed good salsa to overcome the chips deficiency. So far, not so good.
By the time the server came by to take our drink orders, we were ready to order our meals. I did order a glass of sangria. I have to give it a try from every place that serves it. Blech. Worst sangria ever! What a turn off! My suggestion would be to take it off the menu.
I think Donna ordered a pick two and Dave ordered a pick three, while Brian and I decided to share a pick two between the two of us. He got a bean and cheese burrito while I had a the beef quesadilla. It’s pretty hard to mess up a bean and cheese burrito so I’m thinking Brian was fine with his portion of the meal. I wondered about mine, though. My quesadilla came out looking like a soft taco. When we asked the waiter, he said that is their quesadilla. I kind of expected it to be flatter. Hmmm… Brian and I agreed that our waiter could be (a) lying so that he doens’t have to take the food back to the kitchen and make them redo it, or (b) that’s really how they make their quesadillas, in which case I’m sure we are not the first patrons to scratch our heads.
Donna wasn’t impressed with her meal either. She made a comment that the food was way better the first time they tried the place. She gave it a rating of 2 forks out of 4. I don’t really give ratings, I just give feedback. If I make a repeat visit, then you know you’re doing something right.
As I mentioned earlier the food was pretty average and bland. David almost emptied the salt shaker on his plate. Either his food had no flavor at all, or he is just being himself. He is a bit of a salt addict.
I guess the one nice thing is that the server was conscientious enough to take the sangria off our tab. He could sense that I didn’t like it. I gave it all of three sips. I figured maybe it would get better, but it didn’t. Anyway, I guess he saw that my sangria was still very full at the end of the meal so he didn’t charge us for it.
I wouldn’t say the prices were reasonable because I wouldn’t pay to eat that stuff. If I were to put a price tag on the food, it’d have to be negative. I can say the prices are cheap, though. Well, compared to similar restaurants. Three full entrees and three drinks only cost $30. As they say, you get what you pay for…
I have no idea how they’ll stay in business. I mean, if I want to eat Mexican food I’ll go to Abuelo’s or Felipe’s. You wouldn’t be able to drag me back to this place even if you tried. The food was so insignificant that it made me wish that Red Hot and Blue had never closed. By the end of the meal, I was fully prepared to make a deal with the devil to eat at Red Hot and Blue every week just so they would return and erase this place. I give it about six months to a year.
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