El Viejón Seafood Restaurant — Restaurant in Grand Prairie

We've had El Viejon on our "to visit" list since they opened. Went this past week on a rainy, midweek evening. Dining room has three large TVs showing sports. Boisterous music plays overhead. Dining was mostly open, but could be doubled with the optional-enclosure patio space outside. Upon being seated, we were provided with in house tortilla chips served with, not salsa, but spicy coleslaw, and a plate of sliced limes. Perfect for a seafood restaurant! We started with the BOTANA MIXTA seafood platter appetizer. An amazing fry up of catfish, fries, sweet hush puppies with corn, calamari, and shrimp. Son ordered SOPA de MARISCOS. A tomato, seafood based soup loaded with: whole shrimp, crab legs, octopus, scallops, mussels, and calamari. Served with a sidenof rice and buttered toast. Husband got the MOLCAJETE AZTECA. Served with a side of rice and beans, and choice of flour or corn tortillas. Packed with bacon wrapped, cheese filled, Anaheim pepper; chicken, cheese, sausage, napoleon, and skirt steak. I personally ordered the CAMARONES a la PLANCHA: A filling platter with rice, French fries, (different from the batter-fried style on the appetizer platter, these were steak fries), buttered toast, 10 butterflied and grilled shrimp (needing shelling), and a simple salad of lettuce, tomato, cucumber, avocado, and red onion (which I picked out and gave to Hubby for his tacos, lol) . We had to get "to-go" boxes because there was so much food and no room for dessert. The food was delicious. The staff friendly. We...

Second time coming to this place. First time was great, but I can't say the same for the second time. Everything was great until we were about to leave. It was the ticket with the gratuity on it already. I asked the server to take it off because it is optional, for a party of 3 people only. The gratuity is 6+ either way it goes my server "Francisco" Start of being very unprofessional. Tell me why I'm taking it off thats mandatory. First of all it's not mandatory It's optional. He started being very sarcastic with me. In front of my group very unprofessional. I told him let me speak to your manager. He came and followed me to the front and stood there. Waiting for the manager with me and he keeps harassing and telling me things. I don't have nothing to say to him. No more I need to speak with the manager "Allen". The hostess told me he left already. So there was no manager on duty, no assistant manager on duty. So I left there I was still very upset. I called other locations to get a manager. The only location that called me back was Irving. I told him the situation In an hour and a 1/2 later, Allen calls me back. At that time I'm gone. Get nothing done and there was nothing to do definitely not coming back with this attitude of customer service. So if you don't tip them what they want, you will...

Terrible experience. We had server Jose Luis, who rarely ever checked on us I’d like to state. The meals themselves were not the worst. It was the service that was upsetting. Please do not go here unless you want your money stolen. Towards the end of our meal my mother kindly requested a coke to go. before server jose luis put her soda order in she then continued to ask if we could get the bill and if he could kindly separate into 2 payments. He denied and claimed it was impossible because he had already let the transition went through and it had to be paid as a whole. After all this he finally put our to go order in. Us expecting separate receipts as our coke was ordered after our prior order was “finalized” were shocked when only being given one ticket. If you are unaware no matter how small or big your party there is a gratuity tip included after $125 have been ordered. We have no problem tipping whatsoever we usually just leave it cash or in all honesty depending on the service too. The fact that our server lied about our order just to force a tip out of us was upsetting to say the least. We would’ve honestly had no issue the tip was only around $20 but his behavior was just unprofessional. i hope this problem gets resolved in the near future for...