CDMX Brunswick East — Restaurant in Melbourne

My partner found this place which is only 5 tram stops from us so I had high hopes of having found a local Mexican that tastes as good as my “go to” Hotel Jesus. Whilst the food was pleasant and tasty, unfortunately our first experience overall here really didn’t give us many reasons to want come back.

We were seated and only two other tables in the restaurant, so a quiet evening. Even so our waitress took a while to come back to us. Enough time that we ended up playing on our phones while we waited.

We were looking for a light meal and on the waitresses suggestion switched from the Birria De Res $22 to three kinds of Tacos $24. The menu offers a choice of 3 or 4 on a plate. I chose my three tacos, and ordered a side of chips and a small Cevice entre, along with drinks.

The first issue was that for $12 the chips seemed very small, less than a handful of chips. We discussed this and then tucked into our meal while she sent the chips back to try again.

You can imagine my confusion then when plates of food kept appearing - 9 Tacos in all, three per plate.

Turns out that the new menu is unclear on several points, specifically that a plate of three tacos is all the same kind. So when I ordered 3 different tacos I was actually ordering 3 plates - 9 tacos in all. And our waitress didn’t seem to notice that this was the case (despite having mentioned it to the table next to us we found out later) at $24 a plate I started to feel a bit frustrated by this issue.

In the end she cancelled one of our plates of tacos and we finished our meal without getting to try the fish tacos and having paid twice what we anticipated for a “light meal” and eaten 6 tacos instead of 3.

I would have been fine with this situation and the additional cost of it wasn’t for the final surprise of the night - an unadvertised 10% weekend surcharge. This took the already larger than anticipated bill and made it $105 instead of the already pricier than expected $95. Now as a banker who is involved in the whole surcharging debate I don’t like surcharging at the best of times, but I do understand it’s necessary for restaurants doing it tough. What I won’t tolerate is the surcharge not being prominently advertised.

Shame on you for this practice.

I would have given you four stars regardless of our poor service experience. But the combination of all of these issues points to a restaurant that puts profit ahead of service and experience.

This review and our poor experience are entirely avoidable. Please Fix your menu, make it comply with Victorian law around surcharging and include a clear explanation about no mix and match on your tacos.

I won’t be back at this stage, the taste of the food was mostly overshadowed by the sloppy (and incredibly expensive!)...

My first attempt at visiting CDMX was a failure. They had advertised on social media that they would be open for lunch on a Saturday. Excited to try something new, I made my way from South Yarra to Brunswick East, only to find the restaurant closed. The inconsistency between their social media posts and actual operating hours was incredibly misleading and wasted both my time and effort.

Despite this initial unfortunate experience, I decided to give CDMX another chance yesterday, and I want to share my incredibly disappointing incident. While I cannot speak to the quality of the food, the customer service I received was more than enough to deter me from ever attempting to give this establishment another chance.

Unfortunately, my second visit was even more disheartening. Upon arrival, I was told that the wait would be approximately 20 minutes, and my name and phone number were added to a waiting list. Little did I know that this waiting list was nothing more than a charade. I observed multiple couples and groups arriving after me, and being seated before me, leaving me bewildered and frustrated while waiting outside.

The staff demonstrated a complete lack of competence in handling the wait list. After waiting patiently for over an hour, I was ultimately told to come back next week. If they had no intention of following the waitlist, it would have been far more respectful to implement a straightforward first-come, first-served system rather than creating false expectations.

The overall unprofessionalism displayed by the staff at CDMX left me feeling betrayed and thoroughly dissatisfied. The disregard for customers' time and the failure to adhere to their own systems has completely soured my perception of this establishment. I would strongly caution anyone considering a visit to CDMX to think twice, as the poor customer service I experienced is indicative of a deeply...

So opening night last night @ CDMX Taqueria was more miss than hit. We arrived around 7pm to almost a full house. We had to wait only a short time to be seated unlike others arriving later waiting for seats as not enough staff to clear tables. We were seated near the front window which was quite cool every time the door opened. Ordering is via an app on a wonky table which is more suited to a food court. Drinks came quickly. My classic margarita $22 tasted nice but had way too much ice for a cold Melbourne night. There were only 3 cocktails on the menu, lots of beer options, a large range tequila & non alcoholic drinks. No wine for wine lovers out there. Although drinks arrived quickly food was another story. We waited an hr for our food after mentioning twice that we were still waiting. We got a "sorry for the wait" when our food finally arrived. Maybe as good will they could have offered us a free drink. Our birria tacos (these were our faves) and Al pastor tacos were nice. All food comes out on plastic plates which doesn't sit well when trying to reduce plastic waste. There is also no cutlery. We had to ask for water when others were given water after being seated. The music & decor won't take you to Mexico it seems like it's trying to be a more of a hip bar. Yes there were teething problems opening night but staff did an amazing job under the circumstances. More staff should have been hired. I won't be...