Amigos Dunedin — Restaurant in South Island

Very trained hospitable staff. Smiles all around while serving and very attentive. Ambience is like a typical Mexican outlet in New Zealand, lots of cheap decor on the walls. None or non existent music, sadly. Very uncomfortable seating on bar learners, although some lucKY punters were sitting on cushioned chairs. Starters of batatas were yum and crunchy. Guacamole tasted like pureed avocados, not enough seasoning or tartness. Vegetables chips were crunchy and well done. Mains were very flat. No kick of a Mexican dish, not even in the home made sauces on offer. Mixed grill dish had rump that was overcooked and chewy, chicken nibble cut was cheap and flavorless. Nachos had roasted vegetables and it can best be described as interesting. Very little cheese and beans and again lacked the kick. Soft tacos also lacked the oomph of fresh coriander or lime. Our party was in good spirits hence in forgiving mood. The tequila tasting platter had no citrus or salt on offer. Overall, very average. We will give them time to settle down till we come back next. We went here before the big rugby game on Saturday early evening. The place looked busy and our host was a cute smiling girl who looked after us very well. We had a drink each and nachos to share, these were the best we ever had anywhere. Guacamole was full of flavours and fresh lime, salsa was spot on, chips were crunchy and cheesy, sour cream was fresh. We loved it so much that we ordered another portion and that was beautiful too. We definitely had a five star experience this time and we sure are goung to go back. There was so much banter going on in the kitchen and so many jokes being shared. The kitchen was pumping meals and still they were all happy, that has to be the highlight. Working in such stressful environments, you very rarely encounter happy chefs....

Pretty awful experience. We waited half an hour to take orders for drinks. We didn't even get our food order taken; we had to ask one of the staff to take our order about 40 minutes after being seated. She wasn't even a waitress but a chef, however, she was happy to take our order.

1 hour and 20 minutes after being seated I stood up to inquire about our meals and was told they were coming soon. 20 minutes after that the food finally arrived and it was of dubious quality. None of the meals were above room temperature and some were even cold, some of the meals were chewy and difficult to eat and the portion size was nothing to celebrate. Overall the meals were at least tasty although the extreme wait left a sour taste in our mouths.

The icing on the cake is that when we moved to make a complaint the management were quite rude and dismissive of our concerns. No restaurant is ever busy enough to justify a near 2 hour wait time and the fact that we weren't compensated in any way for our inconvenience was pretty shocking. Only thing that saves this from 1 star is that the food wasn't inedible. Cannot recommend at all and will not...

We were put on a corner table by a door and forgotten about for 40mins until we flagged someone down, they got the attention of someone, we then had 4-5 staff all staring at us from afar for 5-10secs seemingly trying to sneakily look over (yeah that wasn't sneaky) and then a few minutes later someone came out and "Hey sorry, I forgot about you giggles" completely unprofessional uncaring tone.

Got to make our drink and food order, after we received food they continued to avoiding us like the plague, went and got drinks and a desert elsewhere, food was subpar, could NEVER praise their joke of customer service, won't ever be coming back, will be sticking to Del Sol.

Edit: Since then, Del Sol have upped their prices by $1, reduced chips by half the size, and changed recipe/burritos etc are smaller. Still tasty, but given they upped price AND made the food cheaper, idk how to feel about that.

Edit 2: Partner has convinced me that we should give them one more chance, I'm begrudgingly agreeing but if they put us in a joke of a corner and leave us waiting again I'm not going to...