El Pollo Loco

What the hell is this? Seriously 1 out 3 times through the drive through they either mess the order up or sabotage the chicken. First they don’t have any Mac and cheese. It’s freaking noon on the weekend. Then I get back to work to a 3 piece. Really a 2 and ¹⁄₁₀ piece.

While traveling from Oregon, we stopped here for lunch. Although busy, service was relatively fast and the staff helpful and engaging. I ordered the «Ultimate Double Chicken Bowl,» which contains chopped chicken breast, pinto beans, rice, cabbage, sour cream, shredded jack cheese, avocado slices and pico de gallo salsa. Quite tasty — I’m always a fan of their chicken and this is a nice combination. The rest of our family was satisfied with their bowls and burritos. I wish this chain would expand to Oregon.

I don’t usually go to EPL and I remember why. The dining area needed attention and the food was mediocre. Only reason we came is because we had a coupon and I hadn’t been here in a long time. Probably will not be coming back.

I usually share a 12 piece family meal, but today I tried the chicken and shrimp bowl. It was just a miss for me as far as flavors go. El Pollo Loco’s chicken is pretty flavorful when you’re eating it by the piece, but somehow it missed the mark here with the kind of dry pieces of cut up chicken. The shrimp was ok. It was cooked well, but I noticed bits of bacon in my bowl, presumably from being cooked with the shrimp. I don’t eat beef or pork because of personal preference. I don’t usually make a big fuss about meat being cooked in with stuff unless it’s like on a large scale or totally dominates the dish so I just picked it out. I looked at the menu again while I was leaving, and didn’t see bacon being listed as an ingredient in the bowl. The bowl also had rice and beans below it, but it was all kinda wet, most likely from the pinto beans not being drained well. The other ingredient of note in the bowl was mango. They were tiny little diced pieces and they weren’t particularly ripe so they weren’t that sweet. It didn’t add any oomph to the overall dish.
In terms of the actual establishment, this place can be pretty hit or miss. I have probably eaten at this location a dozen times over the years since it opened. There have been a few times in recent history where they’ve actually run out of chicken. This is a chicken place. Running out of chicken means they can’t serve you, and if they can’t serve you then you can’t eat. I’ve had to leave a couple of times because of that. The cleanliness of the tables/​dining area and salsa bar is not always good either. It doesn’t seem like they have any consistent employees cleaning up after messy customers. The salsa bar can get pretty messy with people being careless. Salsas and items get cross contaminated and people spill all over the bar. There’s been some instances where I look at it and don’t even want to get any salsa. Definite improvement needed in the maintenance of the salsa bar.
In a positive note, I will say that I do love their crispy chicken tacos. The whole shell is fried and crispy and the chicken is all juicy inside!

I look their chicken but their drive thru customer service has needed to improve for a while. The guys that work there are always kind but the women are rude and there’s one in particular that always seems annoyed at everything. They also have many times forgotten parts of my order & I don’t realize until I get home.

What can I say? … No better or worse than any other El Pollo Loco I’ve been to in Calofornia to date.

Update: They looked like they cleaned up the place, so we tried it again… Big mistake!!! My boyfriend and I saw kids playing in the salsa bar like a sandbox! The next day, he came down with Salmonella poisoning! We regret coming back. The health department really needs to come check up on this place!

honestly, whats hard about getting «two 15’s with shrimp and no pico & a 14 with chicken and no pico» right? Apparently a lot. Not only did they COMPLETELY screw this very, very simple order up not once, not twice, but THREE TIMES, they tried to charge me for the extra #15 when they missed it the first time and gave us a shrimp quesadilla WITH pico, rather than the chicken without. Imagine if someone had an allergy to seafood (I ordered it for my 11 year old son who did take a bite out of it). That could potentially kill someone. So irresponsible. I mean, even the receipt said no pico for every order and every order had pico on every item, almost every time. I refused to pay for the extra #15 which they complied with but had I not argued it, they would have charged me for it as Rey asked for my card again to pay for it.
By the end of the night, I ended up with two #15’s one with chicken and pico, one with shrimp and no pico and a chicken quesadilla with pico. Remember, I order four shrimp tacos with no pico and a chicken bacon quesadilla with no pico. Not hard…
I wasted so much gas going back and forth and in the end, they only refunded me for the for the tacos and the quesadilla and I gave them all their food back but the drinks. Not to mention, the four tacos were just tossed in a bag with the wrappers half undone and the food falling out.
I think after spending 45 minutes wasting my gas because of their mistakes on a no brainer order, I should have received a FULL REFUND. The only way they’ll see me back is if I decide to go back in tomorrow and demand a full refund. Otherwise, I wont be spending money there again and sadly, it was only my second time there in my life. At this point I assume this is their every day work ethic.

Traveling through the area. Stopped at the drive thru. We were told they only had one chicken breast. It was only 6:30 pm. Hmm… a chicken joint that runs out of chicken. Then we decided to go in to use the restroom before getting back on the freeway. The place was filthy. Had we gone inside before we ordered, we would have turned around. There’s a ton of fast food on Shaw. Skip this place.

I always forget how much I like el pollo loco. Well I should say how much I like their tortilla soup and loco salad.

I’ve not had any issues here.
Typically get the 10 piece meal and it’s sufficient. The chicken is always fresh off the grill and the sides have been pretty good.
I didn’t always care for the rice, they’ve changed the recipe a time or two. Right now, it’s good.
The location isn’t always packed like the other locations in town and I think it’s cleaner than they are too.
All in all, it’s better than KFC.

Always very dirty, salsa bar is a mess, and most of the time get my order wrong… Sometimes they even run out if chicken.

This location still sucks. They still have all the same issues as before. It blows my mind really.
I went there to get an avocado burrito and guess what they said. Same old line– We currently don’t have that, even though it’s currently on the menu.
Since I was already there, I ordered one of their new carne asada burritos. Don’t bother, it sucked. It had no flavor, was overpowered by the bland gooey rice.
You know it’s sad when a Taco Bell steak cantina burrito is better than this crap.

Let me start out by saying this place is DIRTY!!! The bathroom was disgusting! I wouldnt let my dog use it. The employees were all very young and loud. They were focused on having fun and not customer service or cleaning the place. There was only two other tables with customers and our food took 20 minutes. The soda machine had no ice. Had to tell them and it took 10 minutes for them to put ice in it. There were 5 or 6 employes there and I have no idea were the manager was. This place has a huge lack of management!
Thankfully the food was good. Same as other locations. Juicy chicken and the guacamole was a little spicy like usual. The sides were all fresh and tasty. So i really had no complaints with the food, other than taking 20 minutes to arrive!!!
This place is grossly mis managed! Hopefully they figure this problem out quickly, cause this is the closest Loco to my house!!!

So I came in with my friend during our lunch time to get something simple and guess what it took them so much time we had to wolf it down and the worst part was that it was cold… I guess they forgot about us or something or maybe gave us something that was sitting for a while. I hope no fly got harmed in the making of my taco.

The food is great but damn they take a long time! Been waiting for 15minutes.

Chicken is good, but you only get 4 or 5 bites of it for $ 7-​$ 8. the «legs» are slightly larger than a USB thumb drive and the thighs are tiny, I wonder if they actually use baby chicken parts. Sides are gross, like KFC they use instant everything so the only decent thing is the chicken which is actually pretty good, you just don’t get much of it so it’s very overpriced.

Hey El Pollo Loco, if I order something without beans, chances are its because I don’t like them! But no, even though I tell you no beans, and then you repeat back to me my order and acknowledge I asked for no beans, why is it when I get back to my desk at work to eat my burrito, there are beans in it?!
This location is literally the worst, they couldn’t get your order right if their lives depended on it. I was trying to figure out why I avoided this place and I couldn’t remember, so I got a burrito today for lunch. Oh yeah, now I remember why!
Seriously, there is nothing more aggravating to take a bit in to your lunch, only to find that it is filled with one of your least favorite food items, something you specifically asked them to not put inside! I should have checked it before I drove off, but its hard when there is a line of cars behind you and you have to not only unwrap a burrito, but then open the thing up, all while trying not to spill the contents all over the floor of your car.
Thanks for ruining my lunch El Pollo Loco, I hope you are happy. Because of you I had to eat a bag of chips from the vending machine for lunch, and now I am in a grumpy mood. Chances are I won’t forget why I avoid your restaurants in the future, and I can pretty much guarantee that I will never in my life eat at one of your locations ever again.

Great place to eat after a movie at the theater! Workers are friendly!

What DaisyMae said… every time I come here, they are unable to complete my order. They are always out of something. One time they were even out of chicken! They never apologize or try to make up for it either. At least offer some kind of free upgrade to one of my other items or something.
The stuff they do manage to give me is usually pretty overpriced for what you get, especially for the «sides.» After this last time, I give up on this location.