Margarita Factory Hazel Dell — Restaurant in Vancouver

my partner and i went on a weeknight. this was our second time, and the fact that we wanted to come back is a good indicator of our first experience.

the place was PACKED and kept getting busier for the first half hour. we were seated promptly by Liz, who was really welcoming. we were disappointed that there were no booths, but happy that there were low table options for us shorties, which she accommodated, warmly.

we got served the yummy, WARM, chips within 2 minutes, but the rest of our opening service was delayed. eventually, my partner asked Joshua if we could order. he immediately pulled out his pad and took our order. none of this: "let me find your server" stuff which seems to breed a certain style of competition in restaurants. he was so professional, engaging, and helpful as we ordered the chunky guacamole (sooooo good!), and split the pastor street taco plate (delish!). oh. and the chamoy margs! we ordered the largest size...one each. so, that is why this review is so belated ;)

Felipe came by a little bit later and apologized for the delay. he asked to take our order and we let him know that his colleague had put the order in. without a beat he smiled and offered to add anything to the order and when he left, he let us know he would be taking care of us moving forward. that's when i knew we were being served by a healthy workteam. and an excellent primary server. everyone seemed to really be looking out for each other as colleagues while making sure we had a GREAT experience.

Daisy was serving another table so she walked by a bunch, each time with a smile and a generous air about her. i eventually caved and asked her how people usually eat the chamoy straw...we both laughed when she said, 'exactly how you are doing it!'

at the end of our time here, and after amazing conversations with some guests, tasty food and drink, i asked to talk to the manager. Jafet came over and listened to my long, detailed story of a great experience, and asked for the names of everyone i was mentioning. i emphasized to him, that if this is truly a healthy team culture, it's up to him and leadership to keep it that way. i feel like he already knows this. he was a really nice guy.

on our way out, i checked with the workers i named here, and asked if they got some good feedback from their manager. indeed, Jafet came through.

great! experience. i'll definitely be back on the regular. especially if the workers seem well-cared for. and we can order smaller...

Four of us went here on a late Sunday evening. Service was fine over all, but nothing to write home about.

Our food was good, however two of our four meals were missing items. The fajita sampler didn’t come with shrimp like the menu said and had to flag someone down. I still don’t understand why you only get three tortillas, they’re cheap. There’s always meat left over. The floutas didn’t come with the “burrito red sauce” as they called it.

Oh the sauce….

The embarrassment and abomination of their so called burrito sauce. It literally tasted like watered down ketchup. I brought it to the waiters attention that it was not a sauce and was in fact watered down ketchup. He proceeded to defend it. I poured some out onto my plate to show him it was not in fact sauce as sauce would not move that fluidly. He then proceeded to tell me that they may have not put to much water in.

What?!

There is no water in sauce. He said that there’s at least some water. No there isn’t. He said he would go taste for himself. When he came back he agreed it was terrible and it’s not normally like that. Hard for me to believe when you hint at the fact that you put water in your “sauce”.

On to other things….

Only two out of our four margaritas were good. Two of them were thick and syrupy. That’s not a margarita, it should never be syrupy. Their margarita flight tasted like kool-aid with way to much sugar put in. The pop rock margarita was unique and interesting,but ruined by the fact it was syrup. However, take my review of this as you will as we have not found a good margarita in the NW. Maybe it’s a culture thing, like how food style changes in each region. Being in Texas for a period of time, gave us excellent margaritas. Everyone who visited us hates NW margaritas now.

Overall, we will not be returning. We can get the same quality of food and better drinks at cheaper restaurants who don’t water down their sauces. $200+ for four people is not worth it. Especially if they water down their sauce. Best case scenario is they have it in concentrate, which would still be embarrassing to have that with what...

Came in for dinner on a Sunday evening. Food/drink- so the food itself is pretty great. Definitely not authentic Mexican, but good non the less, we had the guacamole, which was awesome. Really fresh and the avocados were perfectly ripe. We also got queso dip, which was also really good. We also had the fajitas for 2 and the fajitas themselves were very good, unfortunately the sides weren't that great. The rice was kind of mushy and bland, and the beans were average, but then you get a tiny little scoop of a slightly less than fresh guacamole, and a scoop of sour cream; no cheese no lettuce no tomato. All in all the meal was fine just not worth the $100 we paid. (So really 4 stars for the food, but I give it 3 because it is overpriced for what you get). Margaritas were really good too, just very expensive, $21 for a margarita is a bit much.

Service- unfortunately the service was the worst part, the hostess was kind of shitty and seemed annoyed that we wanted to sit at a table instead of at the bar and I don't really want to rag on the employees, but generally the service was not good, we didn't get all the things we ordered and what we did get took a pretty long time. All in all an almost 2 hour dinner.

Atmosphere- pretty fancy on the inside, I can definitely see how they are going for a fine dining aesthetic, it's just not something someone like me is willing to pay for.

Final thoughts- maybe we just went on a bad day and the service was a one off, so if you're the type of person who wants to spend a couple hundred dollars on a family dinner and you like tex-mex, but don't like spicy- maybe this is the...