Las Palapas Mexican Restaurant — Restaurant in Bangor

TLDR: Excellent, flavorful food, fair pricing for large portions, poor takeout experience, and helpful staff with a slight language barrier. Bangor/Brewer comparison.

Disclaimer: MAINE FOOD IS GENERALLY BLAND AND LACKING IN FLAVOR – Las Palapas is great for what we have. I see numerous out-of-staters giving poor reviews and saying this isn’t real Mexican food because it’s bland, lacks presentation, and it’s not the same as places in the south. Without a hidden gem, hole-in-the-wall local establishment, this is the best we have. Sorry. Get a lobster roll if you’re a flatlander, and not from McD’s.

We’ve had Las Palapas numerous times now, between the Bangor and Brewer locations. The Bangor location is in better physical condition, and the layout provides for some privacy and space in different corners and alcoves. The brewer location has a general walkway and bar as the host area, the booths are in need of some repair, they felt cramped for an average-sized man, and I don’t care for being in one large dining room. I simply prefer the Bangor location, out of personal preference, for a “classier,” less casual restaurant.

Staff at both locations, in my experience, are generally helpful and pleasant. In Bangor, I’ve had two hostesses go out of their way to help me find items on the menu and place a to-go order. I’ve also had great wait staff. In Brewer, while we never got a refill, a waiter brought a rag out to help with a water spill.

The dining experience is enjoyable. They provide tortilla chips and salsa upon being seated, and with to-go orders. The Bangor salsa tends to be medium-hot; the Brewer location is more mild. Regardless, it’s flavorful. The food usually arrives within ten minutes of ordering, unless you have a larger group. The prices are a bit expensive, but the portion sizes are fair for the cost. If you’re not extremely hungry, you could get two meals/servings out of certain dishes. I recommend the Las Palapas Burrito, the Las Palapas Salad, or the steak tacos.

While I’ve had a negative/neutral experience in Brewer, the Bangor location has only provided mild issues for me across multiple visits. The last to-go order I placed, they forgot to provide a container of ranch for a salad. The bottom of the bag also had an extremely sicky, brown liquid on the bottom of the takeout bag. Upon inspection, after cleaning my car seat and hands, it may have been a sauce. I assume some sauce dripped off a plate in a ready window and they neglected to clean it up before placing my to-go bag there.

Additionally, depending on who you get to serve you, they may have a very thick accent. While that’s absolutely not against them personally, I’ve had difficulty understanding and communicating with a few people in the past, which has led to incorrect orders or confusion. I’ve gotten some weird glares and looks from staff before, but mostly at the Brewer location. If you’re used to different cultures, or hearing anything other than our odd down-east subcategory of English, you should be fine.

Overall, Las Palapas in Bangor provides a good dining experience. The food is filling, it comes out quick, and I find myself wanting more. It’s flavorful, and I consider it to be the best Mexican food in the area based on the food, staff, and physical condition of the locations. Keep up the good work!

Best...

Let me preface by saying I am from Oklahoma where we have excellent Mexican food with even better customer service. The food was “ok” at best. The plate I ordered was the Pollo Encremado-it did not come as I perceived in my head it would-no “set-up” as I call it with sour cream, guac, pico. Instead it came with 1/4 of a head of lettuce, a bunch of raw onions and raw bell peppers. It would have been absolutely wonderful had the peppers and those onions been sautéed (there were sautéed onions with the chicken). The salsa was decent. The cheese dip is literally just that cheese—I was expecting queso, but that’s neither here nor the there. The service: when we walked in the young lady that seated us was super sweet! Then came our waiter. Oh boy! He was ABSOLUTELY HORRIBLE! I don’t know what it was about my daughter and I, but he was rude. Left us without drinks, chips, to-go boxes, and never brought us a ticket. He stood behind the bar, apparently twiddling his damn fingers. He had other tables and I was watching his interactions with them. He was laughing and smiling. The other tables seemed to never go without. I’m a southerner, so I and my daughter use our manners. “Thank you” “yes sir” “no sir”—-we were absolutely kind and never demanding. Just literally ordered our drinks. cheese dip and our food-that’s it! Didn’t ask for anything else. I had to go find to-go boxes for our leftovers. Then I had to go tell the young lady at the front our waiter has not brought our ticket. She told him, we heard her, and mind you the entire time I was getting our own boxes and going to get the lady at the front HE WAS WATCHING! What in the mess?! Even after being told we were ready he stood behind the bar and never moved! I lost my mind! Kindness and manners to the extreme from our parts, but also don’t piss me off! My daughter held me back from giving him a piece of my mind. The young lady at the front ended up getting our ticket for us and checking us out! She even told me not to leave a tip, but I did because apparently he had such a problem with us that he needed some extra kindness-it was only $10 which was 23% of our bill. I would normally leave $20-$30. Edgar, whatever problem you had with myself and my daughter could have been handled differently-if you didn’t want to wait on us, you could have passed us off to someone else, I’m sure they would have gladly accepted our tip and kindness. I truly hope this human finds peace...

EDIT Service and food has been not great recently. The desserts I ordered last time tasted stale and like fridge, and were dry. I usually love them. The rice was also a bit weird and flavorless. They consistently (almost every time) make mistakes on orders. For example, I get cheese when I ask for no cheese, or I get no cheese and the person next to me also receives no cheese even though they didn't ask for it. They do fix it very quickly though, once you mention the mistake, but it shouldn't happen so often.

If they don't improve soon, I'll unfortunately have to stop recommending this place to my Airbnb guests.

They were also only taking cash last time I was there but hopefully it was just a temporary issue that's already been resolved. I wish the servers were in a little less of a rush, so that things would get properly communicated. This was one of my favorite places so I'm pretty sad about the decline.

Original

Very fast service, good food, great prices. First time I went there I almost turned around and left (and probably would have never returned) because I and at least 8 other patrons stood there for a good 15 minutes waiting to be sat, even though it clearly wasn't very busy. The hostess finally came over, muttered "oh **" under her breath then proceeded to rudely serve all of us. Thankfully I was patient because after that everything was great. Our server was great, food was SO fast. Like McDonald's fast. Kinda freaky. And everything was delicious. Plenty of vegetarian options. I asked for a modification on one to make it vegan. It was very delicious. I think I'll be a regular of theirs now. Just hope not to run into that...