Agave & Rye Covington — Restaurant in Covington

Tried this place for the first time last night for date night. My girlfriend had been here before and enjoyed it, so we decided to give it a shot.

We arrived around 8 PM on a busy Saturday night. They took our name and quoted a 30-minute wait, which wasn’t a problem—we grabbed a drink at a nearby bar while we waited. When our table was ready, we were seated in an overflow dining area next door. The decor and ambiance were similar to the main restaurant, so no complaints there.

Service started off fine but declined pretty quickly. There were about seven tables in our section, plus a bar area. One of the tables was a large group, but they were already finished eating when we walked in and left shortly after. So not a lot of folks on our side.

We ordered drinks, chips and queso, and our entrées. The drinks came out quickly and were good, and the chips and queso followed soon after. The queso itself was just okay—nothing memorable, but a decent snack while waiting for our main dishes.

For my meal, I ordered a taco flight with the Plain Jane, the Happy Pappy, and the Filthy Fajita. The Plain Jane was the best of the three, but still nothing special. The Happy Pappy was just okay—the carnitas were a bit dry. The Filthy Fajita, however, was straight-up bad. The steak was so tough I had to spit it out, and I ended up removing it from the taco entirely. On top of that, I could tell my tacos had been sitting for a while based on how the queso had hardened—definitely not ideal.

My girlfriend ordered the Birria Ramen (which we heard is being removed from the menu soon) and the Becky taco. The ramen was pretty good—not the best birria we’ve had, but it got the job done. Thankfully, she had a better taco experience than I did—she really enjoyed The Becky.

The wait for our food was long, but given how busy they were (and the time needed to cook the ramen), it was somewhat understandable. What wasn’t understandable was how long it took to get our check once we finished eating. By this point, the room had mostly emptied out, but despite our server clearly seeing that we were done, we sat for what felt like forever waiting to pay. It felt like we were on their time, which was frustrating.

All in all, this place won’t be getting a return visit from me. The service was subpar, and the food wasn’t worth the $80 tab. For that price, I know we could have had a much better meal—and...

OOhhh Agave & Rye, where do I start....the service was a 2 out of 5, the food was 3 out of 5. To start, you seat yourself. This is great in theory, but poor in execution. When a table opens up, you have to pounce on it in order to stake your claim. Then, you have to sit at a sticky dirty table until one of the servers notices that you are in fact, a new customer. They can usually tell by your annoyed facial expressions. Our waitress took 10 minutes to discover our annoyed faces before she attempted to clean the table off with a sopping wet towel. We then ordered waters and drinks and appetizers. Our appetizers came out before any of our drinks. Our waitress stopped by our table to see if we would like to order our entrees without noticing that she clearly had forgotten our drinks. Spicy appetizer and no drinks quickly made our already annoyed faces turn to angry faces. Corn fritter appetizers were tasty, however. Fast forward to the tacos..... the two shell concept falls on deaf taste buds. It's just a gimmick to try to get you to pay another $1.00 to put a smear of cheese or guacamole between them. I am not a fan of flour tacos. It's just not right. Soft corn tortillas is always the answer. We ordered six tacos. We enjoyed two of them, but they were all over priced. Seven dollars for a taco is just ridiculous. I enjoyed the Swipe Right chicken taco, but the Carnita and Maui Maui tacos were just not good at all. The fish was mushy and the pork was mediocre. My friend enjoyed his steak taco but also hated the two shells. His other 2 tacos were forgettable. I had a house margarita. I am a light weight drinker. Usually one margarita and I am buzzed. After drinking the raspberry margarita, I was just fine. It really tasted like plain lemonade. A $10.00 lemonade. Soooo, $80 for six tacos, one appetizer and 2 drinks seems like a complete waste to me considering that we did not enjoy our time at this restaurant. We were so annoyed by the service and lack of flavor that we will probably not be back unless this place changes the way they do things. I just don't understand why they can't have a seating hostess and...

'Contemporary' taqueria with good quality food and service served in large portions and with interesting concepts, some which connect stronger than others.

Came here with a group of 3 for a Friday 5:30 PM Dinner. The restaurant was already quite busy, but we were able to get a spacious booth. Despite being busy the service came quick and we were able to get our orders when we were ready. While the margaritas looked intriguing, I decided to just stick with a Diet Coke today.

We ordered the Trio of Dips - Queso, Guacamore, and Salsa Roja to go with our taco order later in the night. The price was a bit steeper than I expected, but I was very surprised to see how large each of the portions were. The guacamole and queso were fresh and of good quality (not always a given for a chain), and I enjoyed the Salsa Roja (which had an appropriate kick).

For tacos, I was originally thinking to do the street tacos. But wanting to try some variety and something a bit more unique, I went with 2 Epic Tacos - not fully realizing what I was getting into. I should have realized from the dips that the portion would be large and absurd...

I got The Happy Pappy and The Jedi - one relatively a bit more traditional and one very unique - with some beans and rice to share with the table. As alluded, the portion was ABSURD. The Jedi, an asian inspired creation, had chili chicken, crispy carrots, water chestnuts and even LO MEIN. Each of the ingredients were of good quality and individually tasty, but the portion was absurd and the combination felt forced and unnecessary. A fun experience I don't quite need to do again. I could only take a few bits of the other taco (pork-forward), but it was of good quality and enjoyable.

Overall this was a fun experience with good food. I would come again to try some of the interesting cocktails, but would likely stick with some more of the normal,...