"0"^^ . . "1"^^ . "1"^^ . "2015-04-29T00:00:00"^^ . . "We had heard good things about El Toro, and wanted to try it. Some friends gave us a gift certificate, which we used recently. \n\nPositives: (1) The hot salsa our waiter brought us was to die for. Wonderful! (N.B. We had to ask for it--the mild salsa they give you when you arrive is bland and unappetizing).\n(2) There are televisions EVERYWHERE (but aren't TVs a sine qua non of Mexican restaurants?), which in itself is annoying--but the good thing about them is that they keep the sound either way down or off, the net result being that the restaurant is relatively quiet. And we like quiet.\n\nNegatives: (1) The chips were OK, but not even in the same league as those at Don Juan's (disclaimer: Don Juan's has made major changes to their operation, and we haven't returned since they did that, so any comparisons I make are to the old version of Don Juan's, which was for many years Mas Amigos). And El Toro offers only the one hot salsa, not two (plus pico de gallo) as Don Juan's used to provide.\n(2) The enchiladas were pretty poor tasting. I had cheese enchiladas, and they consisted of nothing but melted white cheese inside a tortilla (no onions), covered by a watery, translucent pink sauce that tasted (I do not exaggerate!) sort of like something from a Boyardee can. Neither my wife nor I could finish our enchiladas, and neither of us wanted to take home what was left.\n(3) My wife had something whose name I have forgotten, but it was flat like a chalupa and had guacamole on it. She said the guacamole was pretty tasteless. She couldn't bring herself to eat more than about a third of this item--and again, had no desire to take it home.\n(4) They offer only two kinds of taco filling--ground beef and chicken. My beef taco was acceptable, but not exciting, and nothing I would ever order again.\n(5) My chalupa was quite mediocre. I couldn't finish it, and had no desire to take the remainder home.\n(6) The menu does NOT show prices for drinks, whether soft drinks or beer or margaritas or anything else. You have to ask about every individual drink or brand to learn its cost.\n(7) Our waiter pretty much disappeared on us. We waited a long time for our check--he finally brought it only after we stood up and put on our coats.\n(8) The management wouldn't let us use the gift certificate to pay the tip. We've eaten at much classier restaurants using gift certificates--Biaggi's, Big Grove, Silver Creek (as well as at Mas Amigos when it existed)--and they all permitted us to pay the tip (and I like to leave large tips) out of what's left on the gift certificate. But not at this restaurant.\n\nWe will never go to El Toro again. Our hypothesis to explain why we've heard good things about this restaurant is that our friends simply don't know what good Mexican food is supposed to taste like (FWIW, I'm from Texas and grew up on the stuff)."^^ . . "0"^^ .