Ambar Restaurante — Restaurant in El Paso

Summary: Lack of allergen information on menu resulted in allergic reaction, ruined my meal, and poor customer service to reply to said reaction cements poor experience.

Getting seated was easy, as maybe half of the tables were filled when we arrived at 8 PM on a Friday. Server got us drinks, took our orders, and we drank while waiting for our Tuetano, a bone marrow appetizer. It arrived, I had one of the bones (comes with 5). Less than a minute after I finished eating it, I began experiencing allergic reactions to something, as my lips and throat began swelling. I called over the server, asked him what nuts are in the dish, and he said he'd find out. He came back a couple minutes later and informed me that it has peanuts and cashews, which happen to be two of the three nuts that I'm allergic to.

Nowhere on the menu are any nuts besides coconut and hazelnut listed, and the menu has no warning about allergens, which had led me to believe that every potential allergen was listed on the menu.

I told the server about my allergies, and asked if my main course, the duck in mole poblano, had any nuts. He went to the kitchen and returned a couple minutes later to say that there are no nuts in that course, and he left. My allergic reaction continued, although it lessened, until the mains arrived, but upon taking my first bite, the reactions returned to the same level that they had been with the Tuetano. So either the sheer act of eating just reactivated the lingering allergens in my mouth that my gin and tonic hadn't flushed out, or the duck actually does have nuts in it. Either way, our $20 appetizer ruined my $40 main, and I only continued eating it because I was so hungry. Most of the flavor was lost to my allergic reaction, so I can't even say how it tasted.

Finally, we cleared our mains, the server asked if we wanted desert, we said no, and he started to leave. At this point, I called him over and told him that my meal had essentially been killed by the appetizer, and that the complete lack of allergen information on their menu is incredibly dangerous, and potentially lethal. I personally have almost been killed by half of a cookie that nobody thought to inform me had peanuts, so I needed two epipens on the ride to the hospital to reopen my airway (stopped breathing) and an IV drip loaded with antihistamines at the hospital to nullify the extensive hives on my body. After I relayed this story to the server, I told him that this is why they needed to have allergen information on their menu, and that their manager was risking pretty massive lawsuits for hospitalization or potential deaths of customers without it. The server agreed, and went to grab the check. Check arrived, full amount on it, we paid, and left. Never saw the manager, never really heard any apologies for the incident, still have no clue how good the expensive duck is. At least they let my friends take the bones from the Tuetano home...

I post this review in the spirit of helping the management of this establishment understand the reality of what they are offering in hopes of helping them step up their game!

Sunday brunch is not a good option with this restaurant. $12 valet or a long walk with a man that has metal parts in his legs Upon entry we were quickly seated ( only two other groups in the hotel. The seats have velour backings and are comfortable. The one they seated us at has food spills on the back or stains. Either way it was not a clean feeling environment. The floors were polished concrete but it looked like there was a lot or tracking in the aisle as if it was raining (it was not and had not rained that day). The window directly in front of the do I g room we’re artistically appealing but little fingers has made a mes out of several panes and other were not streak free. This added to the unkept feel.

The menu was limited for midday food ( in my opinion it would serve them better to close than to offer the service that was offered)

Our drink order was taken but there was still a 5 mi Ute delay to bring it to us. We were the only table receiving service. When the drink was brought it was brought in a small glass. Not a problem with attentive wait staff but a big issue if no one ever come back to the table.

Good was overpriced by about double based on The flavors and presentation.

I has the ceviche which as a half attempt at albacore Tuna in some quickly applied spices . Definitely not marinated to cook in juices like normal ceviche then a not so good attempt was made to garnish with some type of greenery. Flavor was good but not 13.00 worth of good.

My wife had a bowl of Chile Poblano soup. It was heavily flavored to the cream side but overall the flavor was favorable. 14.00 USD

Total bill for two 8oz glasses of tea, a ceviche appetizer, a bowl of soup, and parking was over $50.00

My recommendation is do not try this restaurant in the morning or midday meal. At night might be much better as I heard they have a different menu.

Recommendation to the management. If your goi g to open your doors, either cut your prices ( I don’t mint paying a lot for service and exceptional food!!!!) or make massive improvements to the attention to detail in the morning midday service.

Good luck and I hope this does not fall on deaf ears. El Paso needs higher quality dining...

My wife wanted to go somewhere new for our anniversary and so we decided to come here. We started off with drinks, a dry gin martini for me and a tequila, blood orange drink for her (recommended by our awesome server, Natalia). My martini was terrible (and not even served in a martini glass). That may sound silly, but when you take into consideration how much you are spending and where you’re at, an authentic martini glass would be better than the wine glass looking thing they brought me. Anyway, the blood orange drink was great, mine was not. For the appetizer, we opted for the octopus aguachile. It was a little too sweet for our taste but it is exactly as described on the menu. Hibiscus aguachile juice with a spicy kick, we liked it. And the presentation would have been perfect if it hadn’t been for the three random pieces of nan that they put on the plate. For the main dish, we ordered the grilled chicken for two and a side of esquites. I must say, the chicken was good and flavorful, the mashed potatoes were very good as well. The dish came with three salsas, two green and one red. The salsas were not very good and even though I am sure they’re homemade, they tasted like the type of salsa you’d get from a glass jar at the supermarket. Now, the esquites left a lot to be desired. They were made with yellow corn and had nothing special or unique about them. I think that, had they used white corn, the flavors would have been much more memorable. My second drink was an Old Fashioned, which was okay. For dessert, they brought us the Chocolate Abuelita brownie as a gift for our anniversary. It was very thoughtful but the brownie was very dry. The entire experience left us wishing it had been better. Like I said, the service was great (thanks again Natalia), but we probably won’t be returning. As a final note, in the event anyone from there reads this, please have a talk with your kitchen staff. We sat toward the back, against the wall (in a very long table for just two people), but the side of the kitchen next to us exposed us to some of the colorful language spoken by the cooks. They spoke in Spanish and used a couple of very colorful words (v*rga being one of them). Now we didn’t care too much but I do feel like a restaurant of this caliber should not expose customers to that, especially knowing that older crowds might find that...