La Cholita — Restaurant in Northbridge

Hip spot for socializing and Mexican-inspired cuisine. Cash, credit card and probably e-wallet payments accepted. Reservations are probably strongly encouraged, particularly on weekends. But if you show up right when they open you're likely to snag a table before the rush hits. Seating at the bar, booths, and tables with bar stools.

Excited to try this place and stopped by right at opening time. I didn't have a reservation and they were able to seat me with the warning that my table was reserved for 90 minutes later. Empty when I arrived but it started filling up fast and was about half full or more within an hour. Server was attentive.

Food is interesting. Prices are perhaps a bit high by Perth standards but the portions are a bit bigger than anticipated as well. Started with the guacamole appetizer. Very tasty. Baked flour chips (not corn), which means a lot flakier but a little less robust for handling the stiffer consistency of the guacamole. Could have used a few more chips based on the quantity of guac - this is a good problem!

The scallop tostadas are good. Both the menu and the server described them as bite size, but they turn out to be 2-3 bites each, unless you have a really big mouth. The toppings were a lot 'saucier' than I expected, to the point that the taste of the scallops was a little lost, which was disappointing. The taste wasn't bad, it was just more than I anticipated. They are cold, not hot, which I guess I wasn't expecting.

Finally, the baja fish taco and the slow-roasted pork tacos were very tasty. Slightly larger than a traditional Mexican street taco. Not memorable, but not disappointing.

Cocktails are on point here. Both the So-Cal Mai Tai and the La Paloma were good, though the La Paloma lacked some of the sweetness I'm used to (balanced with sour, of course).

The slightly disturbing thing is how fast the food arrived. Particularly the tostadas. Granted, they're cold and so prepped ahead of time. But it was fast. The speed on the guacamole and chips wasn't disconcerting, but the tacos were really fast as well, and were not overly hot. Slightly above room temperature. Just lent the feeling of a lack of freshness because of the speed of service. Then again, this place looks like it has a lot of people there every night and maybe they're just really on the spot in terms of serving times.

Overall a good experience and I'd go back here again next time...

Recently me and a small group of friends and partners, came here for dinner.

The staff were very attentive, kind, polite and extremely helpful. This includes bar and floor staff. Absolutely nothing to complain about in this department and nice to experience good service.

The food had a lot of different options, for all different tastes and also had many options when it came to the heat level. We all ordered different items off the menu and shared them amongst each other. Which, I would recommend as all the food was delicious. Very very flavourful and the perfect portion size. Well done, to the chefs and kitchen staff, you have made Mexican one of my favourite foods to eat again! After many bad Mexican restaurants, I'm so very happy that I got to experience Mexican done right!

The drinks were great and well priced also. Very clean glasses and great service.

I only have one negative, which is the atmosphere component. It was so loud, from the music and of course general talking from other patrons. The music was far too loud to the point, and I could only speak with two people, as I haven't mastered the art of lip reading quite yet 🙊. We had two, neurodivergents at the table with us, and it was a very bad experience for them. Extremely loud, music can be annoying and painful for neurotypical people, so for them it's painful to their ears, it becomes overwhelming, and triggers anxiety and the urge to want to leave.

I heard most tables saying the same thing about the noise levels, to staff but nothing changed. They were very very very busy, however, it's not a nice experience when you can't converse at all, especially for people with different needs, who are suffering and uncomfortable.

As much as I loved this place, not sure if we will visit again, due to the extreme noise levels.

Although they don't split bills, A kind server advised if we all know and can calculate what each of us had, there is no issue with seperate payments. Which we appreciated, as it wasn't a small group of people, it was medium to large I would say.

Thank you, for the wonderful food and service. Please if you could look into the noise levels, that would make it a 5 star rating for sure and would help differently abled people out immensely, as well...

Went in with a group as a birthday dinner on a Saturday evening, that had been prior booked/paid for.

The music was so incredibly loud nobody could have a conversation - we had to yell at one another to attempt to communicate. Even some of the wait staff had trouble communicating with the noise. I completely understand trying to create an environment/atmosphere, but it's a restaurant not a nightclub.

It was incredibly difficult to get a drink. Sometimes we'd be 20-30 minutes without a drink, before heading up to the bar to do so manually - only to be told we weren't to order drinks there and that some wait staff would be with us back at the table.

Lastly the food, being the worst part. It was pre-set, so they were just brought out by wait staff. Different assortments of meat were brought out, followed by some rice five or so minutes later. Great! Ten minutes later, tortillas arrived...? By this time, majority of everything else had been eaten, having no prior knowledge these would be arriving or that we were DIY'ing tacos. Why didn't someone just tell us to wait as tortillas were coming for tacos in the beginning? So, by that point, we had just plain tortillas sitting there, with no filling, feeling stupid we had nothing left to fill them with. I would've thought they'd just be brought them out first - that's a pretty easy concept for patrons to understand.

The margaritas and cocktail list was great. Sangria feels a little watery, but still tasty. The food itself was definitely delicious, but just not chronological. Potentially maybe a short-staffed or hectic night, which I can understand, but a little communication isn't hard to conjure. The rest I can deal with and just accept, but in all honesty, the noise/music levels were just so high it's enough to kill...