El Torito

All the bad reviews on here are accurate: slow service, non-​authentic subpar Mexican food, high prices.
The only thing El Torito has going for it is its table side guacamole and Cadillac margarita. This chain would fare better as a bar rather than a restaurant.
1) they need to learn the difference between shredded and chunky beef, the former being tastier and higher quality. El Torito has chunky beef (even though they call it shredded) and it’s filled with fat.
2) El Torito is turning into Olive Garden in that they inject cheese into EVERYTHING, and lots of it. I’m not a health nut, but biting into pure cheese is just disgusting. And nice try trying to replace the refried beans with the healthier spinach. Too bad it’s saturated in butter so it defeats the whole «healthier plate» idea.
3) service was incredibly slow. Was so hungry I filled up on chips. Kinda ruined the meal for me.
El Torito was great 20 years ago. There’s a reason why so many locations are closing down now. They could learn a thing or two from «El Torito Grill», which is a completely different restaurant but infinitely better.

My wife and I have been regular customers at our local El Torito for almost 20 years and historically found the Carne Asada be one of the best items on the menu. Sadly there have been some recent changes to the menu driven primarily by cost savings. The cut of meat we received passing as Carne Asada was clearly not the same quality as in the past and was not as good as what you could expect from a bad truck stop $ 4.99 steak and eggs breakfast special (the carne asada dinner is $ 18.99).
Every other bite had gristle, the meat was chewy and clearly a very cheap piece of meat.
We won’t be coming back.

The Tuesday Taco deal is a good price and good food, but it took forever to get 3 street tacos. I stood in line for about 25 minutes (after ordering it from my table) and there were only 6 people ahead of me in the line, so it’s not like they were super busy. They had 2 people working it but could have used 3.

Decided to try chilequilles (however you spell it!?!) and it was delicious. Fresh salsa and chips. The diet Coke was too good today. Quick friendly service, easy free parking. Family friendly… not romantic.

I’m a regular costumer at El Torito and I love the place, but today was exceptionally great, went there with my family of 6, we were served by the awesome Adrain, he was amazing serving 4 other tables and we never needed to ask him to bring us anything, he brought all we need and more, the food was excellent everyone in my family enjoyed their meal especially my 1800 fajitas, it tasted so good they did not have to clean the dishes, I cleaned it up, I wish I can give them 10 stars
Thank you Adrain and El Torito.

El Torito will work in a culinary pinch if you are in Placentia.
Co-​workers made the decision to visit El Torito for lunch recently so I again found myself at the mother of mediocre Mexican inspired chains. This restaurant offers a clean and spacious bar area with polite but slow servers. The prices are quite elevated for standard Mexican fare ($ 14 for fish tacos? You must be pretty proud of that fish.) and as for the ambiance… well… Let’s face it, you have been to El Torito.
We started with the table side Guacamole which was actually a pretty tasty little number featuring fresh avocados, spicy serrano chiles, tomatoes and their «special blend» of herbs and spices. This upgrade makes the standard (yet gratis) tortilla chips and salsa offering much more appealing.
Wanting a quick and easy lunch I opted for the special «Dos Tacos» plate that offered a pair of Chicken Tacos served with Frijoles de la olla and rice. It was a modest affair at best. The freshness of the ingredients was on par, but nowhere near impressive. The Chicken was predictably over cooked and had little in the way of flavor, the Beans were starchy and watery and the Rice had more color than pizazz for the palette. Boring? Yes. Terrible? No.

Courtney was our server, she was great and the food was HOTTTT. KUDOS to the chef. Debbie MGR of w. Brea Fantastic Sams

Top notch service even the manager came over to our table to talk to us. I got a coupon which you can bring a friend free to the buffet. Whattttt. 20 buckaroos for two and that is including the tip. That is the best deal in town just make sure that you get there early. The buffet is from 11am to 2pm during the week. I am still full the next day. Yup check it out hollar.

Located on the SE corner of Kraemer & Placentia ave. Have always liked how the restaurant has eating areas sectioned off in smaller rooms so is not so noisy like some restaurants. Hadn’t eaten here in a long time since service was an issue in the past… Was pleasantly surprised. Service was Excellent. We tried one of the newer «family style meals» The Fajita platter was awesome. 4 different meats (chicken, carne asada, carnitas & shrimp) came with 4 sides as well. The sides were endless so would have been enough for 6-​people. Not bad for about $ 50. Looking forward to coming back. Great service, clean restaurant & delicious food. I especially liked the fact that the dining rooms walls are not covered with flat screens like a bar. they do have them in the bar but it makes for a nice quiet dining experience in the dining rooms.

This place is a $ 10 a plate standard mexican restaurant masquerading as as $ 20 a plate standard mexican restaurant. The food is inauthentic and as many others have said the beer selection is disgraceful. Unless you happen to live in the neighborhood and have a strong craving for sub par mexican fare it isnt worth the trip.
TIP: If you have to order the nachos, ask for fresh chips instead of the nacho chips because they’re much better and higher quality than the old ones that come standard; like because they have toppings I wont notice how old they are.

The quality and consistency of the food is always wonderful! The service used to be kind of poor but it has been great the last several times. Elita had been our server and she works really hard to serve us well. Hopefully we can get her again next time too. I enjoy the Macho Combo plater.

Just came back again Improvements continue. Try the Macho Combo. It’s great! Service was excellent. Chips are as good as any place — better than most. If you haven’t been to this El Torito recently, give it a try.

We are visiting from out of town and come here every chance we get. We had a party of 17 and Elida, our server was the best we’ve ever had! Wow! She attended to our every need and was so sweet. The food is the best Mexican food ever. Highly recommend!

El Torito has one big advantage: it’s cavernous and humongous. On a weekend evening, we showed up as a group of 24 and were seated immediately. Next to us was a group of 28 high school students in dressy attire. Walk around the restaurant and you’ll see rooms and rooms and rooms.
The chips and salsa that greeted us when we sat down were most welcome. We ordered some «table-​side guacamole» and liked it.
The draft beer selection at El Torito is depressing. The headliner is Bud Lite, and the remaining beers are big commercial Mexican products that taste like Bud Lite. Wouldn’t it be great to have some local craft brews instead?
The food, while not awful and terrible, is not very good. It’s mostly your classic non-​authentic American Mexican food with puddles of grease and refried beans. I ordered the chile verde plate and avoided the worst of the worst. The chile verde at Andale in Oakland Airport (consumed for lunch the previous day) was much better!
Portions are enormous (humongous but not cavernous); prices are reasonable. You’ll get your money’s worth here.

This place is a definite hit or miss. Since we live close enough to walk here, my boyfriend and I come here on a semi-​regular basis.
Pros:
— Champagne brunch on Sundays. You have to come early though to enjoy fresh food and avoid the «I just fed my soul, now feed my belly» church crowd, which usually consists of children running wild and parents trying to balance two plates of food while you avoid them.
— Servers are usually super attentive during said brunch and have kept our bottomless champagne flowing — bless them. Also, the omelet station is awesome and they make fresh tortillas.
— mahi mahi tacos (here’s part of the hit and miss). The first time we had them they were delicious. Super moist and flavorful.
— If you sit at the bar during your visit the guys are usually very attentive and nice.
Cons:
— If you go to Sunday brunch go early. Believe me, it’s worth it. (See above rant…)
— If you do go to the cantina during your visit make sure you sit at the actual bar. If you’re sitting at the tables around the bar you might as well be adrift in the ocean, ain’t nobody finding you, let alone bringing you that second margarita.
— Mahi mahi tacos. The second time we ordered them they were dry and tough. It was like eating at a different restaurant. We felt a little betrayed.
I’m sure there’s a lot more to discuss about this location, but from our experience it isn’t that bad and it isn’t great either. The staff (when they’re paying attention to you) make up for the sub par food they serve and the heavy pours make you forget about that anyways.

This started out as a very poor visit and we contemplated leaving before it ever got started.
We walked into the waiting area which is very large there was nobody at the hostess stand. We questioned if we were even in the right location. The hostess stand is off to the far corner and it’s basically a big empty square waiting area. After about five minutes we saw a manager walked by and said we would like to be helped or seated. There is no hostess here. He was very nonchalant and borderline rude. He took us to our seats and never really apologized for the hostess not being there.
They really need to do something to the waiting room to make it more inviting and understanding for first time guess that arrive when the hostess isn’t there to greet them.
If we were rating this visit on just the manager and our initial Time in the waiting area we would give them negative stars. It was the server who really turned everything around and save them.
Our server was extremely polite, courteous, and attentive. We had our two year old grandson with us and she was very accommodating and patient.
She did an excellent job of keeping our drinks filled and chips and salsa on the table.
Our food was delivered in a timely manner and it was very tasty. The chefs did an excellent job also. The presentations on the plates were excellent.
Our server gets five stars,
The manager zero stars.
The hostess and waiting area zero stars
Average out to three stores based solely on our waitress and the quality of the food.
If you’re going good luck

I would write a legitimate review, but I’m still waiting for my food that we ordered 30 minutes ago.
Okay, so we waited over 30 mins to get our order. 3 tacos and some rice and corn. As soon as our food got there I asked for extra tacos for the all you can eat, and that took another 30 minutes to get. By the time the waitress got there we were full from the tortilla chips they brought and form the sodas.
This has got to be one, if not the WORST experience I ever had in a restaurant! Very disappointed, and we will not be coming back.

Jasmine was and is a great asset to El Torito. Very attentive and caring to all your needs, as our waitress, she enhanced what was a great another experience.
Enjoyed a great meal, fajitas special with 2 margaritas. These Sunday specials are always enjoyable, a bargain and only made better with the type of service we had today.

Wow, what happened to this place? Not a single thing went right tonight but I want to make it very clear that our server did her best and the majority of the problems were not really her fault. We even tried to make the best of the many, many mistakes but I’m afraid this was our last visit.
My husband ordered a specific margarita, right off the menu, and our server had to come back and ask him again what he ordered, because the bartender did not know anything about that drink. They finally figured out that the menu had changed and it was under a different name in the computer. After it finally came, we both tasted it and there was clearly no tequila in it at all. She took it back and had them fix it and it was fine when he tried it the second time.
Our first basket of chips was almost all tiny broken pieces and and we probably got the equivalent of half a basket and half the amount of salsa they used to serve.
We sat for quite a while after we ordered and when our server bought us each our tortillas, you would expect that our food would be right up. It was probably 15 – 20 minutes later that our entrees arrived and the first thing we noticed (other than cold tortillas) was that my husband’s Chili Colorado was actually carnitas. We asked our server what happened and she said it WAS Chili Colorado but after we both tasted it, there was no doubt it was pork and not beef. We asked for a manager and he confirmed that it was indeed carnitas and took the plate back to the kitchen to see what happened. He came back, with no plate, and explained that the menu had just changed, and that they were now serving the carnitas in place of Chili Colorado. So apparently substituting a completely different entrée without asking the customer is how they deal with change.
The manager asked what he would like to order instead of the Chili Colorado and he settled on Carne Asada, cooked medium rare. The manager brought it out and asked him to cut into and it was cooked closer to well done on the inside and when my husband pointed that out, the manager basically said he was tough to please, but come on! He just wanted what he ordered, cooked the way he ordered it!
As for my food… I had chicken fajitas and apparently you don’t get a sizzling plate anymore. My food was on a long, metal tray kind of thing and the food was barely warm. The portion was tiny and the veggies were barely sauteed and had no seasoning at all.
So after all of that, with manager involvement and everything, not one penny was taken off our bill. You would have thought they would have at the very least comped my husband first drink or his entrée. Up until that point, we were just going to write it off as a bad night, but when we still had to shell out $ 70 for a mediocre meal and non-​stop screw ups, we’re done.

Taco Tuesdays
The place is often packed of course, and parking is sparse. Still, it’s a fun environment and the tacos are pretty darn good. The tableside guacamole is always tasty, and their chips, addicting.
My date and I, had a new server, by the name of Louis. He did such a great job with his personability and energy, that despite there not being enough servers, we still tipped him well.
Our table was sorta sticky, upon arrival, but I never felt the need to address it. It took about 3 minutes to be greeted, 7 minutes for chips and salsa to arrive, and 10 minutes for the alcohol to come. Just a 3-​star experience, in my opinion.