Los Pepe's Battle Ground — Restaurant in Battle Ground

An excellent restaurant I stumbled upon tonight, easily the best mexican restaurant I have been to in the last 2-3 years. I had an amazing time dining with 2 friends there tonight. I must mention a couple dishes that I feel can not be improved upon, and I am a accomplished cook. Los Pepes restaurant is just an absolute recommend.*

Outstanding dishes tonight, they were perfectly seasoned, prepared, and cooked. The three I tried tonight, I would recommend without hesitation.

(1) the "mini" Tostadas de Ceviche, the size of everyone elses regular tostadas, came 3 to the plate and no expense spared in their preparation or flavor. Real fresh lime juice used, no cost cutting with just white vinegar like many places do. The perfect level of seasoning, prepared to the right texture and ratio of ingredients. I thought my home made Ceviche was great, but this was better.

(2) Codorniz - Quail in a sweet lime smokey chipotle sauce, that was charcoal grilled with a citrus slice that was cooked on top of it adding a zest to the overall flavor. A slight mole look, but unique flavor that grew on me and got better with each bite. Bold but not overpowering, and became more enjoyable with each moist, fall off the bone, perfectly cooked bite.

And for desert (3) Deep fried ice cream, usually a desert gimmic for mexican restaurants, but wow they perfected this item. It is big enough to share between 2 or 3 people, or take some home. The caramel, vanilla, cinamon la leche crisp shell was perfect, add a crisp not overly hard fried tortilla base, generous whip cream, and a sprinkling of cinnamon and a touch of something else and I wouldn't change a thing!

Amazing Service. None of the "well since covid" excuses, nothing wrong, attitudes, timing, attention, just right. Atmosphere was NOT overly charged with bad music or a roar of speaking enhanced by poor accoustics. Pleasant ambient volume allowed speaking at a regular volume without being hard to hear, or awkwardly quite. Clean, comfortably lit, beautifully decorated, with comfortable seating, and a very well stocked and curated bar selection.

The cocktails were poured correctly not over powered by unasked for generous pours, but not watered down either. Some instagram worthy huge fish bowl style glass drinks as well.

When I peeked into the kitchen, and truly handcapped accessible bathroom I was impressed with the attention to proper planning, thoughtful layout, fixture selection and placement, that appears to be regularly maintained, resulting in amazing cleanliness and attention to upkeep.

A great place for a date night, or a couple nights a week. Worth driving all the way to Battle Ground, WA., even if coming from as far away as Portland or Kelso.

I feel like they could easily raise their prices 20-40% and I would still feel great about the place. 🙂 ( This is the first review EVER where I have felt...

We really did not have a good experience here. I’m not saying the other reviews are wrong, I’m just saying that last night our first impression was totally tarnished by super slow service and COMPLETELY UNSEASONED food. By unseasoned I mean I’ve had better Mexican food from the microwave. Seriously. I paid $21 (priciest item) for fajitas that included carne asada, chicken, chorizo and shrimp. When my sizzling plate arrived I counted 2 shrimp, 8 strips of carne, one super crusty patty of chorizo and chunks of chicken that had the flavor and consistency of what I imagine taking a frozen chicken breast and putting it directly into the microwave would be like, all on top of a few pounds (exaggerated to drive home the completely lopsided proportions) of undercooked peppers and onions. Served with a basket full of stale store bought corn tortillas (tasted exactly like Mission brand).

The kids menu taquito is a hand rolled burrito that is cooked on a flat top to crisp the outside. That is not a damn taquito people.

Our appetizer was served just minutes prior to dinner service and we were immediately out of room on the table.

The beans and rice were awful. A-W-F-U-L.

After eating just a small portion of our meals we decided that we should speak with a manager about the bill and our reasons for wanting to remove the entrees and pay for drinks and appetizer. Guess what. No manager on duty. He took off early because it’s his birthday. Must be nice. No one on site to handle conflict resolution in any official capacity.

The waiter began to argue with me about the quality of the food and their preparation methods. Not good service at all. He said he would call his manager but repeated about 18 times that it was his birthday and he probably wouldn’t answer.

After a solid 20 minute wait the waiter came back and said they could offer 30% off since we had eaten some part of our entrees. I asked the waiter how in THE HELL are we supposed to find out if we like something or not without TRYING IT FIRST????

No luck. Not much English either for that matter. I paid $57 for garbage. Probably will never return.

Go to...

Came by @lospepes360 because online looked like a nice lunch spot to enjoy the sun. I wanted to love this place for a spot right near Nate’s to grab tacos. WELL… let’s talk about it, as it wasn’t a great experience. First the good. The area it’s located is clean and nice the visuals of the inside and outside were awesome. I got there and was dead a 8 person at a table and another table getting up to leave 3-4 people.

Stood there for about 4 min. Walked around no staff stood there for another 1-2 min a guy comes out and his attitude and demeanor wasn’t well great. I said it’s just me could you place me outside. He said no… walked me to the bar, he said he only has 1 server. I was a bit confused they had 1 table and me so I said cool can I just order at the bar and take my food out side? He looked frustrated and paused and said yeah we are just busy we only have 1 server…. And he walked away… At that point I was like ok I’ll just order To go and leave not gonna do this he walks by about a min later says hey bro come out side I’ll open it. He opens the door and said all good I will just order Togo. He said no it’s ok I’ll open the outside. Mind you just bad demeanor the whole time.

So I walk outside the server comes out with chips and salsa. I asked if he was the owner she said yes. I told her the issue. I said I just wanna get 4 tacos asada and a small side of sour cream. You can only order in 3s so do you want 6. No I’ll just do 3.

She comes back with a bowl of sour cream… I notice a big ass hair in it… I’m like ok…

Food comes decently quick about 8-10 min.

ISO I’m just here to have a relaxing plate of tacos enjoy the weather. I get sour cream around the hair and go to enjoy the tacos and the tortillas are under cooked or they were frozen and not cooked all the way. At this point I’m just like I just wanna eat these and leave not good flavoring. But was $11.25 I guess this is what you get so was affordable right?…

Drops bill off appoligizes again for the guy and there’s a $3.25 add on for that “small” size of sour cream…

Long and short it’s a cool vibe but the rest don’t go here...