Buena Vista Restaurant Mar Y Tierra — Restaurant in Algonquin

I can’t honestly remember a worse – and disappointing - dining experience in 30 years of paying for meals as an adult.

My wife and I used to love this place when we lived a little closer and would go for Saturday night dinner and then on way home do the weekly grocery shopping. Big night on town huh?

It’s been a few years since we last visited but an on-line deal site ran a $30 value for $15 deal so we thought that would be worth the trip.

We took our two teens and upon arriving at 6pm on a Sunday night they were kinda surprised we thought so highly of this “dive” as they called it. They weren’t off the mark too far.

We stood at the door like idiots waiting for the one server to seat us. I guess the three tables of three to four customers per table was too much to handle to even acknowledge us, so we sat at the only clean table left as the other two were piled with used dishes from a previous diner.

After about five minutes, we finally got some menus and we all ordered one entrée priced around $7.95 each. Three soft drinks (which were never refilled) and one margarita.

Took about 20 minutes for the food to arrive and the waitress THEN brings the chips and salsa. No other sauces to accompany the meal. Still, we looked forward to the great food we had experienced in the past.

Blah, Bland, Boring, Bad. About the only thing that had flavor was the one salsa brought with the chips. We spooned that onto our food to give it something. Oh, the Cokes were pretty good. The margarita was basically lime juice with no alcohol.

The other bright spot is I have a growing teen son who’s always hungry and the size of the King burrito filled him up. So, I was just going to chalk this up as average and just enjoy we spent time together as a family.

We then sit for 20 minutes waiting for the waitress who now only has two tables to serve bring left over boxes and the bill. Finally I just go up to the take out counter (which only had one take out the entire time we were there) to get some boxes and give her the certificated that’s good for $30 value.

That’s when this really gets bad. She proceeds to tell me the Chimichanga special I ordered and the drinks are not covered and the bill is $57 and we owe $27. My wife and I look at each other flabbergasted as we figured we were about $12 over the certificate value. I tell the waitress who speaks very broken English that there must be a mistake (since she made mistakes the entire evening delivering the wrong food to the few tables she had). The only exclusion on the certificate is alcohol. I tell her our food should be around $32 and ask what the drinks cost. $2.50 for each Coke. So that’s $7.50. At this point, we owe $9.50. She continues to argue with me then calls to some older gentlemen who comes up, looks and the certificate, and then starts yelling at me in Spanish. Unfortunately, my vocabulary is rudimentary so I have no idea of what he’s saying. She keeps pressing buttons on the register and keeps saying special and drinks not included. I finally tell her to call the police because I’m not leaving, but I’m not paying either and that they are ripping me off while I’m not trying to take advantage of them at all.

After about 15 minutes of her muttering and me continuing to say I am only paying for the over cost in food and the margarita, she comes up with $16 as the total due. That would include tax so I’m assuming the margarita was $5. I paid and we got out of there as quickly as possible.

We finally get out to our car at 7:30….1.5 hours later for what was worse that Taco Bell. I wouldn’t eat here again if it was free and I’m mad at myself for not looking at the reviews first before buying the certificate because it’s obvious based on the reviews on various sites that this place has gone wayyyyyy downhill.

To top it off, my teen daughter was going to take a walk and gets ½ way down the block…and has to run home because she got the runs from the place!

AVOID AT ALL COSTS….PLACE SHOULD...

I have been going to Buena Vista (specifically the Crystal lake location) since I was a kid and it’s always been my favorite in the area by far! Always consistently good and my entire family raves about it. We had a birthday party for my son and didn’t feel like cooking so we heard that the Algonquin location did catering orders. Juan was so easy to get in contact with and was very accommodating and helpful. I ordered 10 lbs of meat for a taco bar for a great price and all of my guests absolutely loved it! Everyone ate plenty and we still had a lot leftover. Along with going to the restaurant to eat/take out, we will 100% be doing catering orders with them again in the future! Thank you Juan for being awesome to work with and for the consistently...

Love their salsa. Let me restate that...it's the best salsa you will ever have. Period. We drive an hour just for their salsa. Made with roasted tomatoes it is to die for! Their other salsa is made fresh daily and contains just the right amount of spicy kick, with fresh ingredients. Nice view of the Fox River. It's not fancy but the food is excellent.

The last two times we visited however at 12:30 PM on a Saturday for lunch, they were closed. Sadi they were open but were not. Very disappointing. We will...