El Mariachi Mexican Grill — Restaurant in Fort Smith

This place is clean, well decorated, the staff is excellent, the food is incredible- before I ate here, my favorite Mexican food was served at a place in Missouri that has won numerous awards. El Mariachi blows them out of the water. (Sorry, still love you ToPe)

I had street tacos, carnitas. Most incredible, well seasoned carnitas I have ever had in my life- I could literally eat that every day for a month and not get sick of it. Do yourself a favor and order from this place because it is hands down the best Mexican Restaurant in Fort Smith.

My only critique is that the tomatillo salsa- which is ultimately my favorite anywhere hecause of how smoky and incredibly flavorful it is- is pretty mild compared to other places, but according to anyone who tries my food, I prefer things extremely spicy, so it's probably just me. If I say something wasn't spicy enough, take it with a grain of salt because apparently I can't tell anymore when stuff is "normal spicy" vs "very spicy" and I've made my own kid and niece cry more than once because they thought I was tricking them when I literally just did not know something I was eating was spicy. Rant over.

┐⁠(⁠￣⁠ヘ⁠￣⁠)⁠┌ I did say sorry and bought them ice cream.

I will be returning here frequently. I'm gonna get married just so I can have El Mariachi cater my wedding. They can cater the...

First off, service was great and the atmosphere was also great! Even though the food portions were very generous there were inconsistencies with the dishes. Let’s start off with the appetizers, the salsa tasted homemade but the queso had no seasoning and was very bland. I had the Parrilla which I order at every Mexican establishment I go to, I was very underwhelmed. The dish made no sense, it was under seasoned and instead of carne asada and chorizo it was a weird mixture of ham, boned in flank steak, and all of the juices that rested at the bottom made the shrimp greasy and odd. Even the tortillas seemed like a throw away due to being cold and not homemade. My date had Chili Relleno which had very thick breading where the chili seemed lost and came with a mountain of beans which was drenched in red sauce with no flavor and seemed like an after thought. The weirdest thing was the taco next to a guacamole salad. The taco meat was under seasoned and the taco shell seemed store bought. I hope the next experience we have is a much a better one. The service is what will...

The food and the service are both amazing. The item I'd evangelize is the Tostadas de Tinga, it's unbelievably good. El Mariachi is definitely worth a visit if you find yourself in the area.

I would suggest trying some items from the El Sabor de la Casa - A Taste of Home portion of the menu. Some of the offerings are things that you won't find anywhere else, and they are delicious options if you want to step outside the box.

As of this posting (5/30/21) they have not been open a full month yet and staffing seems difficult for almost every dining option in town. Recently, several new restaurants have opened and a lot of established restaurants are seeing business start to pick back up, which leads to staffing shortages as a whole. I would say either visit with that in mind or maybe give them another couple of weeks in hopes that staffing levels can catch up. Personally I didn't have any issues with service, but I have noticed some folks did in other reviews, so just something to be aware of.

Pictured: Tostadas de...