Lucero's Mexican Bar & Grill — Restaurant in Columbia Township

I must preface my review; I dislike giving negative reviews. I do it so others have good expectations. With that, here goes:

I visited Lucero's on 5/22/23 with my wife, and my niece and her boyfriend. We were quickly seated outside on the side opposite the parking lot.

A male server took drink orders relatively quickly. We ordered 3 beers and one iced tea. The beers took a bit but finally arrived. My niece waited 10 minutes for her iced tea. After that, it was a while before our server came back to take our orders (longer than reasonable, it wasn't very busy).

After our food order, it went rather down hill in terms of service and food quality. We didn't see our server again for a very long time after ordering. (in fact, we didn't see him until 10 or so minutes after our food was brought out by others). We wanted more drinks, but he never returned to refill or ask if we wanted more beer until after we were eating (about 35 minutes after ordering).

Food arrives, and my plate has lukewarm food on it. (Pollo Asado), the chicken was minimally warm, but the rice, beans, were not warm at all. My nieces carne asada tacos were actually cold. No exaggeration, they were flat out cold. I had mine heated back up, but she opted not to because she doesn't like confrontation. My wife liked her food and it was warm, but it arrived as an incorrect order. My nieces boyfriend seemed to enjoy is chorizo tacos.

Overall, service was really poor, not much attentiveness. The food, once served hot, was good, but it took correcting. My niece and her boyfriend have been there many times, and they said this is the worst visit they've had. Maybe something has changed that has impacted the overall quality of the restaurant?

(their homemade salsa is...

If I could give this review negative ratings I would. Usually I don’t write reviews but this experience was appalling. Hopefully the owner will be able to see this review and make some changes if they have any pride in this restaurant. The restaurant is beautiful but as a Spanish family they should know better to serve food of this quality. Whoever is the cook, needs to understand how the food is supposed to be flavorful and made authentically and fresh. Not microwaved.

We visited this restaurant tonight and it was such a let down. The food lacked flavor… rice tasted like it was boiled in water for way too long with very minimal spices. The beans (if that’s what they even were) were also flavorless. The dishes brought out were microwaved and not made fresh. I had hardened food all over mine. $85 worth of microwaved food is what we received. The mango margarita on the rocks was pure syrup. As a Spanish family, this restaurant is such an insult to Spanish cuisine. When Spanish people cook, they cook from the heart and with pride. I cannot believe how the food is made, prepared, and presented especially with Spanish people working there. It’s extremely shameful to our culture to serve such lifeless, disgusting food. I wouldn’t recommend anyone to eat here and waste their money. It’s the last...

Honest opinion from someone who has traveled Mexico and grew up in Southern and Baja California:

The food is okay for what it is. The carne asada taco plate for nearly 16 bucks and doesn’t even come with rice, just beans. That’s weird and I even doubled checked after I got my plate. Just beans. The carne asada tacos were average with tasty soft shells but nearly no meat for the high price. 16 bucks for almost no carne asada doesn’t excite me. The non-native staff could not understand what grilled peppers and onions were, so they gave me a chile relleno and charged me 5 bucks for it. I just wanted a nice chile toreado. If you don’t understand, don’t assume and charge people for the wrong thing. Since I got the chile relleno, my honest opinion is it tastes fine, but man was it mushy and had 10x more cheese than chile. If this was all I had, my rating would be lower. The salsas were very average and lacked flavor. There was zero kick which is probably to appease the locals. Oh well. Lots of places offer plain tomato sauce salsa.

Would I come back? I would not go out of my way to return. If you are hungry and that’s all that’s around? It will get you by and do the job. They might have way better options I have...