Cafe Rio Fresh Modern Mexican — Restaurant in Gilbert

Normally, I do a point system, but this place was exceptional in my experience, so I need to do them just as much justice as they did me.

I entered at 8:50, and went to order. There were only two people there, and they were both busy with the drive-thru. Three employees, one with a headset, were sitting at a table laughing and eating. It took about three minutes (with no line) for them to get to me, which is understandable.

I wanted nachos, but I was informed on asking for them that they were out of queso. I thought it a nice gesture that they told me, but also felt confused as to why they'd not make more. I politely requested to switch to a burrito. Everything went fine until the second gentleman, now done with the drive thru, got my order.

I wanted shredded lettuce, and he proceeded to DESTROY the burrito with lettuce. I'm talking about like four big scoops of lettuce. I had to request he remove some, to which he obliged, but acted as if doing so was a hassle. Then they were out of sour cream, so I told him it wasn't an issue, and I'd apply some when I arrived home, as I had some at home. I got guacamole, which was brownish, and then paid for my order and left.

Arriving home with my order, I removed a bowl's worth of lettuce and still had MORE in the burrito. The tortilla for the burrito exploded apart when I tried to pick it up to make it an actual burrito and not just a tortilla bowl, so I just decided to rip up the tortilla and make a burrito bowl out of it.

Being honest, i feel that the employees did everything they could to make the experience better. However, it seems management does not care what happens to the store, or if employees slack off. I will be returning to this location soon, as I normally enjoy the food I get, but this time was laughably awful. Queso and sour cream are extremely important parts of a large majority of orders I see people get, and to let their employees run out suggests a terrible ordering error, or a genuine lack of care to the customers.

Overall. (Normal day, not this visit.) Food:9/10, really good nachos, wide variety, but needs a little less spice, in my opinion. Service:9/10, sometimes they're stressed, and that's understandable. Wait:4/5, occasionally busy, but the line moves fast. Cleanliness: 4/5, an ice cube, occasionally dirty table, nothing to complain about here. Bathrooms: 10/10, stocked, clean, and always pleasant to the nose. Price: 6/10, a little on the pricey side of things, but nothing too crazy. Usually, it's about 14-17 dollars for an order for one person, depending on a drink. Total:42/50. A good place to stop I'd you're okay with paying a...

This order was placed on February 27th, 2025. I ordered two burritos from the website for in-store pickup. Both burritos were ordered to have queso on the inside and outside of them (which is an up charge of $1.79X2 for it to be topped with queso and $2.29X2 for queso style totaling $8.16 before taxes extra I am paying). With that said, once I got home I discovered that only one of the burritos was topped with queso, luckily I lived close to the location so I drove back to show them my receipt and to get my queso for the burrito. They apologized and topped the burrito with queso. Once I got home and my husband and I started eating, we discovered that BOTH of our burritos did not have any queso on the inside of our burritos. So, with all the queso that we had purchased we originally received on 1/4 of what we payed for (1/2 after I drove back to the store). In addition, the rice in both burritos were undercooked to the point where we did not finish our food. I also ordered Habanero sauce on the side and was given Hatch Chile sauce and I did not have any shredded cheese in my burrito, which was easy to see since there wasn't any queso to cover it up, and the horchata was not great at all. We also were not given any utensils. The store had only one other family in line ordering and the lobby was virtually empty. There is no reason why there would have been so many mistakes to my order. The fact we paid about $17-$19 per burrito should mean we don't need to check the outside AND inside of our order before leaving the store. This trip resulted in wasted money and food. The photos show my order, showing we ordered queso 2 times per burrito, no queso INSIDE the burrito and the habanero sauce I did...

This is one of many, make visits to Café Rio over the years. This was the worst experience, however. My 2 previous visits to this specific location were also very bad, so I have to leave a review. 3 strikes, and I'll never return.

I order the same thing usually, the shredded beef quesadilla. The shredded beef tonight was minced, almost like a puree (gross!) to start. Then the worker placed like half of the normal amount. They prepare it with the tortilla open on the grill, put like 1 inch (way too much) of cheese over the entire tortilla, let cook then she proceeds to cover about 1/4 of the tortilla with the beef. I asked for the normal amount which is 1/2 covered, and she said I have to pay more for extra meat. I again asked for the normal portion and she brought over the lead. He said no also, so I left before it was done cooking. I'm not about to pay $14+ for a beef quesadilla with only HALF the normal meat. So much cheese, so little meat. I've been to other Café Rios before and have never had to ask for the normal amount of meat.

As I walked out, there was a family/friend group of 10-12 who spoke up to me and said they were shorted on all their meals as well.

Their Google reviews for this location are already 3.2. I do don't recommend this location. Café Rio had gone down hill. I told the kid walking in while I left about it quickly and he turned...