Surcheros - Alpharetta, GA — Restaurant in Alpharetta

New to Alpharetta, homegrown Surcheros' Flagship location.

Highlights:

1. Design. The commanding architectural presence of the restaurant belies the low prices on the menu. The overall footprint of the space and the materials used set an expectation of a much more expensive full-service restaurant. Indoors, a clean and minimalistic design features very open space with plenty of natural light afforded by a perimeter of glass rolling garage doors which most likely open up during ideal weather.

A sealed concrete floor and high quality furnishings with wood and porcelain accents creates an adult atmosphere that you don't find at any competitor's locations. Thoughtful touches like electrical outlets at booth seats are attributed to the ownership's recognition of our mobile on-the-go lifestyle. An expansive outdoor patio in front of the restaurant increases the capacity to almost double what you see indoors.

Head upstairs from the patio to the deck and you can enjoy a view of downtown Alpharetta without the premium costs of restaurants and bars just a block away. Overall, the restaurant exceeds the expectations you would have for a fast casual or quick service restaurant. You almost feel like you don't deserve to be at a place that is this nice for as little as you're spending on the food.

2. The Food. Once you get past the dazzling design features, focus turns to the food which proved to be over the top in freshness. The way the bar is prepped and maintained, there is a very clear impression that everything is prepared fresh by knives and cutting boards and not can openers. That freshness comes through with the flavors; I had a jalapeno cheddar tortilla with veggie burrito fixings and it was the best I've had at any QSR or fast casual spot, better than the local Mexican full service restaurants. The prep staff was attentive and made good suggestions for the burrito build.

Lowlights:

1. The POS System at the checkout was the least intuitive Ingenico keypad I have seen at any retail or restaurant location. The screen presents itself as though it were touchscreen, offering Yes and No options for tipping and total amounts but it's not touchscreen and requires using buttons that do not correspond to the Yes and No options and you have to fumble through that screen twice in order to get to the actual payment step. It is probably only a confusing barrier the first time because from that point forward you will remember the worst POS system you've ever seen and probably make it through quickly. Also, the keypad is not fastened well and wobbles a lot as if the restaurant had been there for 10 years and the mounting brackets had become unstable.

2. The bunch of boxes at the beginning of the food queue, which was very surprising based upon how well thought out and designed the rest of the restaurant is. So when you're standing there about to start your order your sightline is directly focused on a wall of cardboard boxes which doesn't make it feel very fresh or "restauranty" and certainly not a polished restaurant. It is just out of sync with the rest of the experience at Surcheros

3. The microscopic guacamole. Granted, I ordered a small guacamole but a small guacamole barely was enough for four tortilla chips. By my math it works out to guacamole at about $32 a pound. I won't order a small again but I don't recall what the other sizes cost. They cannot possibly be as expensive per ounce.

4. They lost the salt shaker. Or at least they lost it at the tortilla chip station. The plus side is that the tortilla chips are made freshly right in front of you as you are building your burrito but the downside is there doesn't seem to be any salt on them and they do seem to be a bit too oily (OK, maybe more than a bit).

Bottom Line: Overall experience of the restaurant and the food quality overpowers the very small flaws and yes I was being picky about those flaws. It's just that the rest of the place was so perfect that the small hiccups stood out. Will I be back? Absolutely! I think probably at least once a week. It's...

I had a really good experience the first time I ever ate Surcheros, but every experience (5 in total) has been successively worse. I cannot recommend anyone eating here.

There are 3 main issues: stocking of ingredients, consistency, and food safety/hygiene.

Regarding ingredients, they are always out of items - meats, veggies, rice, tortillas, you name it. Don’t ever go for dinner especially after 7 PM. By 8 PM, they’re cleaning up and getting ready to shut the place down.

Which brings up consistency. The first time I went, the staff was friendly and helpful. Every time since then, they’ve been hit or miss. I found they often acted like you were inconveniencing them if you wanted to order food. For the record, I never came in within an hour of closing time and I never ordered anything complex. Sometimes, I received massive amounts of an ingredient - enough for 2 or 3 orders. Other times, they would scrape the dregs of a hotel pan for barely enough protein to call it a burrito.

The food handling standards are abysmal. There’s massive amounts of cross contamination. DO NOT EAT HERE IF YOU HAVE FOOD ALLERGIES. I always found stray ingredients which I didn’t order in my food. Additionally, the kitchen looks messy - particularly the food service stations.

Finally during my last visit, I nearly broke a tooth on an unidentified object in my nachos. It seemed to be a small piece of bone (about a centimeter in diameter) with a tiny bit of pink meat clinging to it. As if this wasn’t grotesque and dangerous enough, my meal was vegetarian.

So I won’t...

Additional update post response from the business: While the business responded back below asking me to contact them, I already sent two emails with the complain the day this original review was written. Willing to update my review if the team truly demonstrates seriousness in this concern by reaching out rather than requesting another email be sent.

Updating my review a few mins later because it gets worse: we found a rubber band in our food. So not only did we not receive the correct order, but we are basically faced with a heath code violation. Definitely not returning :/ Went in person to order it was sheer chaos even though we were the only customers line. I came home to see that I only got one taco out of two which was super disappointing. There is no logical system lining up which order is which persons. And in fact we weren’t even sure we got the right burrito by the end of it. The taste is great, but if you don’t get what you order there’s no point having delicious food. Hope they can get this sorted out since it seems to be a consistent issue, but not sure I’m willing to give them another chance if I’m not gonna even get 1/2 of...