El Bees

I have been eating at El Bees since I was a little girl and would go there with my parents. I’m disheartened to see so many negative reviews as I have always enjoyed the food. I order the same thing every time. We start with the nachos with chips, cheese and green chills. I love to dip them in the hot sauce provided at every table. For my entrée I always order the kid burro! Strange I know but there is nothing equivalent to it on the «adult» portion of the menu. It’s basically a burrito but it’s the sauce they smother it in that is so delicious followed by a layer of shredded cheese. For dessert we always get an order of the sopapillas that come to the table piping hot and are served with honey. Probably my favorite part of the entire meal. I have never had a bad meal or bad service and I will continue to return!

I would give 3 stars but for be value and price of food it is pricey. About 9.00 for enchiladas and 4.00 per tostada or tacos for being out in the middle of west Omaha.
I ordered one beef tostada, I personally would not order this again when coming back. The meat was colder than I would like and dry, but there were lots of lettuce, tomatoes and cheese. No onions, or sour cream or refried bean paste, something I’m used to having as complimentary. Salsa is included on the side. Size was about the size of a standard salad plate.
I would try next time if I am back the chicken and cheese enchilada. I saw it being ordered at another table and it comes with beans and rice. It’s not worth taking a trip out for me, but would stop again when headed towards to Lincoln from Omaha.

The Macho Chimichanga was delicious! Very generous portion size and I appreciated that the menu was fairly small– some Mexican restaurants have an overwhelming selection, but El Bee’s had it narrowed down. I would go again!

PERFECT when that crazing for good, Mexican food arises. The BEST chips and salsa, when you have an extra $ 7. Hopeful one day they’ll be complimentary as we wait for the main dish. Top shelf margaritas naturally!

Cheese is what you get here lots and lots of greasy cheese. This place in my opinion is worse than Taco Bell.

Unfortunately for me, my in laws love this place and drag us there from time to time. As other reviewers have stated, drinks are OK, food is terrible. I swear Romeo’s and El Bees are owned by the same people. Food tastes the same, bland, boring, over priced, and underwhelming. The décor is something out of a 70’s era bad dream. Chairs and booths are dirty, torn. Plastic cups for your drinks. Just gross, I hope I never have to go back but I know I am not that lucky. At least they give you a tootsie pop to mask the bad taste left by the awful food.
On the plus side the wait staff are usually attentive, but here in Nebraska most restaurants I go to seem to have genuinely nice hard working server staff, regardless the quality of the food. If you ever travel down south, you know what I am talking about when I say the customer service level here in the Midwest is tough to beat. Still looking for the best Mexican food in Omaha, to date I have not been able to find it. I haven’t given up hope, I am told there are a few good places here.

Having grew up in Omaha I have been going to el bees for years and love their food. A few years ago I had to move to New England and I have yet to find a place with Mexican this good! Heading back to Omaha next month for a visit and I definitely will be eating here several times!

Quick and easy Mexican food for lunch. Service is quick but the food is only average with an above average price. This could be because most of the items can contain enough cheese to feed the Green Bay Packers.
The freshly fried flour chips with pico is my favorite things but the actual menu is pretty bare bones compared to most Mexican restaurants. Good or bad experience at least you leave with a free tootsie pop.

Two tacos to go… nothing to drink and it was $ 9.50. I’ve had several items and while most items can disappoint the tacos are «ok». They are huge and even two tacos will stuff most big appetites. Go in with low expectations on quality and expect to pay more for Mexican food than you probably have a most Mex restaurants.

I am so sorry to say this is without question the worst Mexican food in the Omaha Metro and more likely the entire state. To go for the drinks are ok, but not the food. I would give zero stars if I could. Ownership has no shame to continue to offer this poor tasting/​quality food to the public!

This place is always such a disappointment. It’s been in this location for many years and so you’d think it had proven itself and wouldn’t still be around if it wasn’t any good. Not true. Perhaps it was the only Mexican food in this «neck of the woods» for so long that everyone in the vicinity grew up eating it and so lack of choices at first followed by habit and nostalgia have kept it going.
No free chips and salsa. Everything comes out of the kitchen looking the same. It doesn’t matter what you order. They all have different names and slightly different ingredients, but they all look like the same steaming pile of cheese and sauce. Overpriced for the unimaginative Americanized Mexican cuisine it is.
They serve the kind of Mexican cuisine you expect to get if your friend invites you over for dinner on Mexican food night and you get served his family’s version of Mexican. Sure, they’re fond of it, but objectively, it’s just not good.
Service is usually bad. One exception is last time we were there there seemed to be one waitress working the entire dining room and she was phenomenal at it. I was genuinely impressed. However, most times the service is inattentive and not particularly friendly.
There are better Mexican food options in the area now (Azteca comes to mind). Perhaps their original location in Waterloo is better than this place, but somehow I doubt it.
Restaurant is looking rundown and rough around the edges. That tells me the owners aren’t reinvesting in the place.

El Bee’s used to be the go to place for Tex Mex food. Prices were right, good portions and they had amazing red sauce at the table to spice up all your favorite dishes. It has been a while since we had been and they still pack ‘em in on Friday nights. We ordered the Con Queso dip and chips, my wife had their Burrito fantastic, I had a Taco salad, my daughter had eggs Ranchero and other daughter had chicken fingers… yes. chicken fingers. While the cheese dip was good (not as good as their original recipe), the waitress had trouble keeping up with her tables and she did not have time to refill our chips in a timely manner so the cheese sauce got cold. Both girls enjoyed their meals. The chicken fingers and waffle fries looked really good. My wife enjoyed her Burrito Fantistico and my taco salad was just OK. For as much as they charge they could have put in a little more lettuce. My cafeteria at work has a taco salad for sale that competes with El Bee’s. However, that red sauce is awesome. One of the best in Omaha. I can eat the whole bottle in a seating. Overall, the dining experience is still OK. While their prices have gone up the total dinner experience has slipped some. They need to put some of their dollars back into their facilities. I will still go back as they are still better in my humble opinion than many of their Omaha competitors including Omaha’s voted best La Mesa. Still looking for an awesome Mexican dining experience. I know it is out there.

I thought this place was very nice. Very rough on the outside, but once you get inside, two thumbs up! Good food, and a full bar.

This place is over priced and mush on a plate. They charge around 14 $ for a tostada that consist of room temp beef and watery chicken. A plate that is a million degrees and alot of lettuce to cover the mush. 4 $ for ice tea… and 7 dollars for chips and salsa. They think they are making good chips but they are a slightly thicker than paper… and taste like it to… avoid if you can you will leave broke and disappointed

First of all, they charge for chips and salsa. Do yourself a favor, save some money and just order the side of chips and use their house hot sauce. Only 1.99 versus a ridiculous 6.99 for the same amount of chips and a bowl of chopped tomatoes.
Nowhere near authentic Mexican. Better yet, save your money and go elsewhere.

A Mexican restaurant that charges for chips and salsa, really? Not only charges once, but we had separate checks and the charged ALL of us. Worst Mexican food in Omaha, will not be going back.

This was by far the weirdest quesadilla I ever had. Covered in greasy cheese and enchilada sauce, so much so that you can’t even see the tortilla. The chicken wasn’t even seasoned. By the fourth bite, I gave up trying to kid myself that it was even remotely good and pushed it aside. Also, chips and salsa are like $ 6. Definitely won’t be coming back.

First of all, don’t expect real Mexican food. This is more Tex than Mex. I’m sure this place was good in its heyday, but it has grown old and dreary.
Besides, they don’t offer complimentary chips and salsa. That, you have to pay for.
I stopped in here for lunch one day, and decided to go with the burrito plate. How can you screw up a burrito plate? It’s quite hard actually. The meal wasn’t horrible, I could still stomach it. But, the «salsa» that it was doused in, tasted more like ketchup.
I gave it two stars as the meal was filling and there was a good deal of meat in the burrito. But I wasn’t impressed with the service or the décor.
But where I went wrong was, I didn’t cross the interstate and go to the real Mexican restaurant.
For the price, I wouldn’t go again.

You know when you get so hungry you panic, get shaky and pretty much look for the first place where you can eat as soon as possible before your stomach collapses into a ball of emptiness?! Ok? Well this is how I ended up at El Bees.
I was trying to make it further into Omaha to grab lunch with a friend, but my body just physically needed food in the 100 degree heat while I was driving out west on 370 from Bellevue.
First, I ordered chips and salsa right upon being seated. Thinking, «Well, if they are not included with the meal, surely they are only a few dollars…» Wrong. Just so you know, an order of flour chips and salsa will set you back six dollars at El Bees. Worth if if you are on the brink of a low blood sugar coma. Pretty steep otherwise.
Taco salad was pretty good. I like the house red sauce (enchilada sauce?) that was on the side with dressing. Truthfully, I devoured it so fast, I could have been eating shredded newspapers with the sauce on it and it would have been delicious.
Which is why I’m giving this place 3 stars. I feel if I was in my right state of mind, it may not have been as wonderful as I thought it was, or it might be better. I do know that my parents used to take us kids to the original El Bees in Waterloo, and when I was eight, it was pretty sweet to get a toosie pop after your meal.
So yeah, that’s El Bees…

HELL YES.
This is my most favorite Mexican place in the entire United States. Scratch that. THE WORLD. Bold statement but totally true.
El Bee’s has the BEST chips and cheese dip. The cheese is not too runny, not too thick. It’s perfect. And you can pick from two types of chips– corn and flour. Trust me, pick the flour. I’m sure the corn is good (because everything that comes from this place is awesome), but the flour is so wonderful, just writing this review, my mouth is literally watering. They’re a bit greasy and totally full of flavor. I could order a plate of this for dinner and be totally satisfied.
For dinner, I usually order the enchilada. El Bees first introduced me to the tasty mole sauce and just like a first love, I’ve tried others but definitely have a fond spot in my heart for their totally flavorful sauce. The enchilada is full of fresh juicy chicken, yummy cheeses, and whatever else toppings you’d like. Good tip: Save some of those flour chips you ordered as an appetizer and dip them in this enchilada sauce.
To top it ALL off, as a nice little happy ending, every bill comes with a handful of Tootsie Roll suckers. Don’t ask why or what the connection is between Mexico and chocolate and candy covered suckers, just take it and smile.
* Sidenote: GREAT for parties or for families. They have a little arcade «room» when you walk in and growing up, after getting a sucker, the arcade was high up on my favorite things about this place. Also, helpful tip: El Bees does cater to those picky little eaters. They serve an «American kids menu» as well, full of cheeseburgers and chicken tenders.