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| - Oy! Zocalo, you just did not do it for me, at all.
This is coming from a "silver-lining" kinda gal, but even the location does not redeem this place. In fact, this restaurant hardly does this location justice! Harsh, I know--but on a street like E. 4th that's just littered with great restaurants and venues...you really need to be up to par.
My first (and only) visit to Zocalo was with a large party of about 12-14. Right off the bat I usually cut the restaurant some slack with bigger groups. I realize that it takes a lot of coordination to get everyone's plates out around the same time. I also understand the stress that it puts on the kitchen and the servers to get things right. But sadly, even with my "slack", it was just not good.
Half of our group's food came out 20-30 minutes before the rest of our table did. Again, I can appreciate that it is a difficult thing to manage a huge order like that, plus a full restaurant. So, although the wait was long, I forgave that. That was, until 3 of the orders came out completely wrong. Yikes.
The food? Well, I love Mexican food. The spiciness, the melted cheese...*drool*. This was not what I got at Zocalo. My food was rather bland for Mexican--so much so that I literally had to bathe my entire dish in their salsa. But hey, I love fresh salsa and Zocalo's does that right! (Redeeming quality right there.)
Some good things? Well, the servers were very sweet. Although there were a lot of mistakes, I'm sure it wasn't all their fault. They both looked so frazzled, so I made sure to thank them for taking care of us. Margaritas were tasty, not the best, but good. The homemade chips and salsa were also fantastic. Ironically, I filled up on mostly those waiting for my sub-par meal. It's like my body already knew what was going to happen!
I'm not saying that I wouldn't ever go back to Zocalo, but it wouldn't be my pick. I'd go with a couple of people for a happy hour and maybe some apps.
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