La Bamba

Cheese enchiladas with red sauce had a home-​cooked taste. Salsa is so-​so.

This is my go-​to place for cheap Mexican food. Friendly, attentive staff and always delicious!

I’ve longed for La Bamba since I first had it 2yrs ago… maybe I should blame it on being especially hungry that night or just having a great night out in Richmond, but this place was heaven’s Mexican food on Earth. Food was tasty, with offerings out of the realm of traditional Mexican restaurants, and came of hot & fresh! Vegetarian offerings are on par with best. Stop in to La Bamba and treat your taste buds.

There are too many Mexican food places in this town to put up with the rude service from the owner/​manager. Ive heard HORROR stories about this place. I always went back… Until today. Never again.

Best dollar tacos in Richmond! Strong margaritas, cozy booths, and the friendliest staff make this place a favorite!

The most important thing to remember: La Bamba is what it is. And for what it is (your basic neighborhood Mexican restaurant) it is quite good. Come here for a quiet spot to laugh with friends and enjoy good quality, late night cheap eats. I have overall been happy with the food I have ordered here and unlike other reviews I had no problems with the service. Our waitress was great. The one thing I was disappointed with was the margarita. It was very sweet, artificial coloring with no tequila taste.

Best Mexican food I’ve had in Richmond, and at a great price! Excellent queso and relaxed atmosphere.

No, it is NOT okay for you to serve my and my guest’s completely separate orders ON THE SAME PLATE. Who does that?
Staff also needs an attitude adjustment.
Dollar tacos super soggy.
But it’s open til 3 am, soooo they’ve got that going for them.

La Bamba is nothing fancy or amazing, but my friends and I come here for $ 1 taco Thursdays (must order a drink with this deal). I usually stick to the soft chicken tacos but have also tried the fajitas and enchiladas. Two tacos usually fill me up pretty well, but I recommend about 3 to 4 tacos if you have a bigger appetite. Their complementary chips and salsa are the bomb and I eat way too much of those everytime.
Their frozen margaritas and alcoholic drinks are huge and the Latina woman makes em strooooong, no skimping on the alcohol here!
They also have a small private lot parking in the front but it’s usually packed (on Thursdays anyway).

Second time coming here and had awful service. Salsa was too hot. Food was good but very bad service. We then saw them cleaning tables with Windex.

It’s a bit far from my office so I don’t get here too often, but I always feel like it’s a workday lunch treat when I do.
The menu is typical Mexican restaurant menu. The food comes out fast, and tastes fresh and flavorful. I like to get the Tamal, Chalupa and Chile Rellena.
I just love that it’s really affordable, tastes delicious and the service is good.

There are times when I really wish that Unilocal had two rating systems — one for food and one for service or experience. I’ve been going to La Bamba for years — it’s the best Mexican restaurant downtown food-​wise and I absolutely love the fajitas. They are about $ 15 which isn’t bad for fajitas — a lot of places will run you $ 20+. Plus, if you get take-​out/​delivery the portions are huge which makes it a great deal. If this review was based on food alone I’d give it 4 stars easily, however a perfect world this is not. The problem with La Bamba is that the service is absolutely atrocious. The servers are inattentive, rude, they will walk away when you are in the middle of talking, and at times, they will bring you the wrong dish and blame it on you — this has happened multiple times. If you’re looking for drinks, the margaritas are good but are a little light on the alcohol and they have absolutely no idea what a vodka soda is — seriously, they’ll give you a Pepsi with vodka — so just stick with a beer and you’ll be golden.

Honestly the food was pretty good, but not for the price. We went in for the buy one, get one half-​off margaritas. We ordered two, but they tried to charge us full price, stating that we would each have to order two in order to take advantage of the special. There is no stipulation about that made on the sign on door. The margarita I had also had little to no alcohol in it, my girlfriend’s must have had a bit more than mine. I will not being going back to La Bamba. $ 10.99 for two chimichangas is a bit pricier than I expected in this dive location. Would love to go to dollar taco night, but that’s about the extent of my visit.

This place is pretty much our Mexican eatery from now on. My husband and I ordered online/​pick up awhile back, it was amazing even when it wasn’t fresh on a plate. The delicious Fried Chimichanga w/​beef tips was what we got. The next time we ate here was last night and this time we dined in. The hubs and I ordered the same thing since we knew we liked it and the food was even better fresh! Service was okay, a bit slow to the table but the warm chips and salsa and flavourful food made it okay. Eat here if you want great Mexican food. Seriously.

Definitely authentic. Good prices and you get exactly what you order. Cool vibe inside although somewhat small booths. Little patio on the side that would be nicer in cooler weather. I’d definitely go back.

I have ate here a total of no less than two dozen times. Every time i have come home stuffed and ready for my next visit. I truly enjoy the atmosphere as well as the staff.
Everything is good. Their chimichangas are the best. If you can eat a lot I definitly recommend getting a dinner entrée then adding a single item. It will cost you about 15 or so but it is totally worth it.
Takeout only takes 10 minutes or less.

Truly awful Mexican food. I ordered a Burrito Mucho Hambre (or some Burrito Hambre).
The waitress was not helpful when I asked whether there was sauce inside the burrito (there was), and I asked for cheese inside the burrito, but she kept insisting that there was a melted cheese sauce on the outside and that’s NOT what I wanted. I think there was a language barrier, even though using Spanish didn’t seem to help.
Also, who the HELL puts melted cheese sauce on Mexican food!!! It seems like it was all the dishes that had melted cheese sauce. It was so disgusting. It was like a lump of chickeny mac and cheese with awful flavors and no noodles. The beans were lukewarm, the rice was mushy (and had peas for some reason), and the whole dish made me feel very bad afterwards.
My food was appallingly low quality. I only went for convenience, and I’m never going back again.

Okay so I came here tonight a (Thursday) 2.50 $ — coronas and 1 $ beef or chicken tacos I got 3 they were very good! And filling our food came out super fast the only trick is if you get a 1 $ taco you have to order a drink. Which is understandable! They have a really nice outdoor patio! And I recently discovered that they deliver! Yes.

Jeez. I don’t know if we caught the server on a bad day (I suspect he was also the owner, but my friends disagree), but the service was some of the worst I’ve had in my life. Even worse than what I had at the Pig and the Pearl.
We walked in, and he told us to sit wherever we wanted. The four of us grabbed a 6-​top table. He came outside and made us move to a 4-​top. We were kind of chuckling because the place was completely empty. Then he disappeared for about seven-​eight solid minutes.
When he came back to order our drinks, I ordered a frozen lime margarita. He told me their machine was «down,» then said something like «I spoke wrong, it was actually just turned on.» Then I asked how long until frozen would be ready, to which he responded that he couldn’t guarantee that it would ever be working. Quite confusing. So I ordered mine on the rocks.
He brought our drinks out, and my friend got a frozen strawberry margarita. I, very politely, told him I didn’t realize that other flavors were available frozen, and he didn’t even let me finish his sentence before he snatched my drink off the table, turned around, and walked away in a huff. At this point, we’re assuming that he is going to spit in our food.
I’ll spare you of all the other details, but the service did not get better. He was rude the entire time. One 5-​top and one 2-​top table actually came in and left before even being served drinks because he took so long to get to them.
The ONLY redeeming factor is that the food was surprisingly good. I got a vegetarian combo of spinach quesadilla, spinach burrito, and spinach enchilada, with a side of spit.

Para bailar la bamba…(sorry, couldn’t resist: P).
I’m going to Guatemala this summer with a campus student organization, and we decided to have a dinner meeting at La Bamba! Since we had such a large group (15 people), the restaurant combined four tables and seated us outdoors. It was a comfortable temperature outside, but during the first half of our meal, many of us were concerned about a potential thunderstorm. The clouds looked a little suspicious, and there was a 50% chance of rain; we even felt a few isolated raindrops while we were ordering. Fortunately, it never actually started raining and we made it through the night. In fact, it cooled down a little after the sun set, which was quite pleasant.
Our group leader told the servers that we were going to Guatemala and asked them to refrain from speaking any English with us (although the restaurant is Mexican, the waitress was coincidentally Guatemalan). Thus, we had to order all of our food in Spanish. ¡Fue una buena oportunidad para practicar español!
Unfortunately, we had to wait quite a while for everyone in our group to show up (15 – 20 minutes). We then waited a period of time before our orders were taken, and a considerable amount of time again before the food arrived (I arrived at 7PM but we didn’t start eating until 8PM). Luckily, we were able to chat with each other and munch on chips and salsa to pass the time.
I ordered the Morelos Special, which was beef (and bonus chicken apparently) con arroz, frijoles, y un tamal. The meal also came with two chicken taquitos and guacamole salad. When my plate arrived, I was originally disappointed with the portion size. There were no taquitos to be seen; instead, grilled chicken meat accompanied my beef. I started wondering why my meal did not match the menu description. However, it turned out that the rest of meal would come out on a separate plate (the two taquitos, salad topped with guacamole, and some sour cream).
The food came out nice and hot (so hot that the waitress brought out our dishes using oven mitts). Flavors were excellent, and my meat was tender, well-​marinated, and not too dry. The friend to the right of me ordered the fried fish dish, which came as an ENTIRE deep fried fish (head + tail included)! I think I will try that the next time I come!
Possibly because of the heavy food and possibly because I had so many chips while waiting, I was VERY stuffed at the end of my meal. I had considered ordering horchata as a beverage, but decided to spend less money. Someone else did order horchata later though, and said it was pretty tasty!
There wasn’t anyone sitting inside the restaurant while we were there, but the restaurant’s interior is actually pretty cool and colorful. The blow-​up Corona bottles (balloons) and other drinks hanging on the wall were fun, and there are a number of candy dispensers near the cash register. [FYI: There was a small sign by the register advertising a 10% discount if you paid with cash. I didn’t have that much cash on me though, so I can’t verify this statement since I paid with card.] There is even a jukebox by the door! The atmosphere, especially with Spanish music playing in the background, was a lot of fun!
Instead of splitting our bill so many ways, the waitress just asked each of us to pay separately at the bar. She also told us to come back tomorrow for the Cinco de Mayo fiesta! ;)
I definitely plan on coming back here, since: a) it is within walking distance from home, and b) I want to try more items off of their really extensive menu!