Tios Mexican Cafe & Cantina — Restaurant in Columbia

I have worked in fine dining since I was 14 and my parents have been in the Business for upwards of 35 years and we all agree we have never heard of or experienced worse service. My friends and I arrived at 9:45 to play trivia and we were seated in the backroom where we were told it would be harder to hear the game but that we could still compete. After sitting for 20 minutes without being so much as acknowledged by a single staff member one of us went to the hostess and asked to be served. The hostess said that she was unsure who had sat us here but would take care of us herself and claimed that the other girl was "new and confused". My friends ordered drinks and a nacho dinner and she took our order. Our drinks came after 25 minutes and then the nachos, which were microwaved shredded Mexican cheese on tortilla chips (that is it, melted cheese on chips for $6). My friend explained that she had asked for the dinner to which our waitress replied condescendingly "well you need to be more specific, obviously the dinner is more expensive". She brought out peppers and ground beef, which she said she would pay for, for the nachos. This would have been fine had the beef not tasted, smelled, and looked like dog food. My friend then ordered another drink which she waited for 25 minutes for before our waitress admitted that she never put in the order. After another 15 minutes she came back and asked why we still hadn't gotten our drink. Then, instead of making a new one, she ran around the restaurant searching for the missing drink for another 10 minutes. Eventually the brought our checks and explained that she tried to comp our chips and salsa but that her manager opened our check and made her charge us. At this point we were so fed up we asked another waitress if we could see a manager. She explained that multiple people actually come in and request NOT to be seated with the server we had but that she would talk to her. We explained that that was okay with us but we did not want our waitress to come back and treat us worse than we had already been treated. Low and behold ten minutes later our waitress comes back and explained that she knew we wanted to talk to a manager but "if the chips were the issue it wasn't her fault". We explained that the chips were NOT this issued but rather the overall experience and service was poor. She immediately put the blame on her coworkers such as her manager and the "new" hostess. We also all explained that we work in the food industry and understand the stress of the job but that we all felt our service was unacceptable. She replied to this by saying "well I could call the cops on you" and slammed our change down in front of each of us. Then before leaving she said "Also, do not tip me, I get it i don't need it". At this point we requested to speak directly to a manager and all he said back to each of our complaints was "I'll handle it". At this point we took our waitress's advice and did not tip her because after all she "didn't need it" and left. We all have never been treated so poorly by a waitress or the staff. I know for a fact if someone complained to the degree we had where I work everything would have been comped and I would have been fired on the spot, but apparently Tios does not care at all about customer satisfaction or service. It's a shame because I used to enjoy this place a lot but unfortunately I will never be returning. If you want a good Mexican restaurant don't even waste your time here, just go to Cantina 76 where you will always be treated the way a customer should be. I would give 0 stars but one is the lowest...

If I could put zero stars I would. Tio’s has some of the worst service I have ever experienced. Our server’s name was Allie and she was extremely unpleasant and rude- clearly not very scared to hold back her opinion. When first taking our IDs, the server acknowledged that our group of friends had “fake IDs” and then continued to say she would serve us anyway, but that we “need to drink water.” Later during the meal after some complaints over her “losing” my friends Peach Rum (which I assumed she just forgot to ring in) and running ransom around the restaurant to search for it, taking 20 minutes to give us chips and salsa, talking poorly about the hostess, and admitting she forgot to ring in something about 45 minutes AFTER the fact- she told us that she could call the cops on us and get us arrested for our IDs (even though in the state of South Carolina if you serve someone with a fake ID, YOU lose your job. No excuses. Every restaurant is supposed to have an ID book to verify IDs.) I guess our complaints disgruntled her. She then told us she spoke with the manager who didn’t care to comp off any food, beverages, etc. even with the awful service experienced. The manager came over and said she acted the way she did because she was going through a tough time. Oddly, at the restaurant I am a waitress at, I don’t take my bad days out on my customers and if I ever did, I would be fired on the spot. Most managers tend to comp off food when a customer is dissatisfied. Well, this manager didn’t care at all and said he would “deal with it” to every statement we said. When ending the meal and returning our checks, she mumbled under her breath when leaving the table, “yeah. I get it. You don’t have to tip me.” And that’s just what we did! Truly astonished with how tonight went and I will NOT be...

First time and will definitely be my last time. It will not be for the service (because the staff was very friendly) BUT the food, on the other hand, was horrible. It was just wrong on so many levels. I guess I was looking for something authentic, but Tios Mexican Cafe & Cantina certainly missed the mark. The Salsa tasted as if it came from a jar/can and the chips were definitely from the bag.That should have been a clue, but we were hungry (so ofcourse we ate the chips) I ordered the chicken quesadilla and Spanish rice. The quesadilla was cut into fourths. The first piece had only cheese no chicken, ok fine, I can live with that, most of the chicken is in the middle anyways. The second piece had some chicken. The chicken tasted as if it was rinsed with taco seasoning and water. There were raw chunks of onion and tomato (both cold) also thrown into the mix. I picked up the third piece of quesadilla and all of the filling stayed on the plate. Why? Because there was no tortilla backing. When I flipped the fourth piece over there was no backing either. I guess the cook attempted to cover the fact that my quesadilla was raggedy on on side. Oh and the rice. The rice was not cooked, it was crunchy. We informed the waiter, who informed her manager. She apologized and then proceeded to heat the rice in little ceramic bowls. By this time our luch was already ruined. The crazy thing is that she even confirmed that the rice was uncooked. Uncooked crunchy rice heated in a microwave (or whatever heating device) for a few minutes equals hotter uncooked crunchy rice.

Maybe the original cook was out, maybe not.

I cannot speak for all of the dishes and I surely do not want to try them.

Tios Mexican Cafe & Cantina is a THUMBS DOWN in the food department, based on...