El Alma — Restaurant in Austin

Hits and misses here. The queso fundido was insanely good. We all agreed that was the biggest hit of the evening. In fact, it was so good I did not get a photo before it was gone and it is served with warm fresh tortillas. Do not miss that.

Excellent bar service and cocktails.

The menu really needs to be done in my opinion. Lacks information needed and leaves the consumer to be the chef in some instances which is hit or miss. It's organized all over the place, and where normally the dish is in dark bold, it's the lightest, it offers few descriptions as well. For example, under tacos you may or may not guess it's just one taco and comes with one side. But the worst part is with the lack of descriptions, you are made to guess putting your meal together. I decided on the shrimp enchiladas but have to pick my own sauce, rather than have suggestions of what pairs best. Because the sauces lack very little description I chose "chipotle + crema" picturing this to be the creamiest sauce on the menu which would go well with the shrimp enchiladas. But there was very little description under any of the sauces so it was a crapshoot. I chose wrong. It was strong chipotle, not creamy at all, and had a crema DRIZZLE over the top but everything was drowned out by the chipotle flavor and it simply was not good. My tablemate had it with the chicken but had the same reaction. That said, her enchilada was still better than the shrimp one.

The tortilla chips served with the salsas were stale. Salsas were good though.

We loved the atmosphere. Very pretty and unique stone wall.

The service started out fabulous but then we were ignored and couldn't get our bill to save our life but we knew who the manager was because we had already watched him and noted he was a really good one. He was an impeccably dressed black man who was really on top of things and we felt that impressive...he moved about the entire restaurant, even checking the air vents and temperature, and front of the restaurant for cleanliness. As soon as we told him we could not get our bill, he was ON it and we had it in seconds. So I do not fault him for this in any way. He had no way to know that. And he was very helpful. We pulled him aside to get it because it was quite obvious he was the manager.

I would go back for cocktails and the queso alone. I would probably try something other than figure-out-your-own enchilada dishes and even with them being a miss, the refried beans and rice were perfect.

The tacos served to my other tablemate were kind of sad. Just two small tacos on a...

The tex mex is still great but, the service left a bad taste in our mouths. We were told no less than three times by three different staff members (host, waiter, and manager) that our 530pm reservation on a Saturday evening was for exactly 2hrs and that we needed to leave the table by 730pm.

We were a civilized table of 4 adults in our 40s. We ordered cocktails, aps, meals, and desert. We were there to have a nice experience with friends. There was no need for them to repeatedly approach our table to tell us of the end time of our rsvp. The waiter kept approaching our table and making it seem like they wanted us to rush in ordering and in eating and I did request more time a couple of times so that the staff would give us space.

Then the manager approached us while we were eating dessert, around 7:10ish or so to suggest moving us to a nearby empty table, also a 4 top, as a way for us to stay later if we wanted. It didn’t make sense why they would want us switch tables when we were almost done and we still had 20 mins per their short scheduling. We felt rushed and uncomfortable.

Honestly, I feel guilty for recommending this place to my out of town friends and I actually apologized to my friends as we left the restaurant. I have never been treated this way. I have been to this restaurant several times in the past and I remember it having great food and great customer service. Things have definitely changed and not for the better.

In my 20s, I was both a hostess and a waitress at several high end restaurants and I understand the demands of these jobs. I feel confident in saying that this experience was terrible due to management. The fact that the staff pushed us like that, that the manager felt the need to approach our table, unrequested, to remind us of the end time of our rsvp, and then also just bad management planning on the rsvps.

Perhaps the rsvps should be better spaced out? Or maybe, management needs to rethink how they communicate with staff on how to manage customers with time in mind without making customers feel rushed and uncomfortable. Certainly, management needs to consider how they communicate directly with customers.

Overall, I will not be coming back to this location on a weekend with an rsvp. If you want to go here, I would recommend planning to go...

I was looking for a swanky spot and came across El Alma. It's an authentic Mexican food restaurant with a fun vibe and ambiance and green plants alongside rocks as an interior decor with a rooftop.

We happened to get a parking spot right in front of the restaurant. Upon entry my wife and I were greeted and seated immediately. This was Mother's Day around evening time. We choose to sit inside to avoid a 30 minutes wait for the rooftop seating. Our server quickly introduced himself and got us started with a couple of cocktails. I had the Cara Tropical, Cara Tropical (carabuena blanco, passionfruit, ginger liqueur, lime, agave, sugar rim ) on the rocks. My wife had the Flaquita (watermelon-serrano infused El Jimador tequila, watermelon, lime, agave, chile rim) on the rocks. Both of these drink were very good.

We ordered the Jalapeño crab queso dip (Ancho butter, crab, grilled jalapeños, cilantro, white queso). This was very tasty, the has a pleasant taste and the crab isn't overpowering. The chips were very good too. I ordered the Pastor (Adobo pork, pineapple, raw onions, cilantro, lime) and the Pato (Roasted duck, almonds, pepitas and escabeche onions). The Pastor, I had on corn and it was a quality pastor taco. if you're a pastor afficianando definitely give this taco a try. It's very flavorful and moist. The Pato was good too and the ingredients blended well. The duck was moist, this is definitely a uniquely flavored taco. Definitely try both of these. I had a bite of the two tacos my wife ordered. She ordered the Shrimp al pastor (Adobo shrimp, pineapple, slaw, avocado, lime) and the Lamb barbacoa (Habanero pickled carrots and onions, cilantro). The shrimp was good but the taco had too much slaw which pulled away the flavors from the shrimp. It was better when I removed some and took another bite. The lamb barbacoa was a little dry, but if it has great potential to taste awesome if it wasn't on the dry side.

For dessert we ate the habernero empanadas served with a side of vanilla ice cream. Unfortunately we didn't like it. The crust was very doughy and had a spice which I thought was nutmeg that was very overpowering. The ice cream was good but as whole dessert this wasn't for me and perhaps not for you either, however i would recommend everything else I mentioned in...