El Tiempo Cantina — Restaurant in Houston

Just very disappointed, my favorite spot for weekend brunch. One thing I can say is that I have gone to the brunch many times and it is never consistent with the sides they are missing so they make up with something different, it's a running joke with me and my friends, we have never had a brunch plate look the same from week to week. This weekend was different, My Eggs and pancakes came out in a very timely matter, but it was cold which I couldn't understand, because it was less than 10 minutes fro when I put the order in, it would have no time to get cold, My waiter was busy so a kitchen staff brought my food out and literally dropped the plates on the table and just said eggs and pancakes and he was gone, I looked down at my plate, no potatoes, no beans and no fruit cup. Just eggs and 2 pathetic undercooked strips of bacon. The pancakes had zero pecans in them. I know restaurants all have "off days" this was beyond being off. I have been coming to El-Tiempo for 20 years now, ever since the location on Katy freeway at Wirt, and yes the quality of the food has gone down year by year, It's like they opened too many locations and need to keep the doors open so they hired efficiency experts come in and they showed them by using a cheaper product and less skilled kitchen staff they can save so much money! not realizing it took the love and soul that was put into the food. The prices have gotten high, and I would have zero problems paying today's prices if I could get the same food they had 10 or...

Flavors were generally good. Ambiance was ok. Service was not. Prices were VERY expensive for what it is.

Queso- good. Steak fajitas- great. Crab nachos- great. Tuna fajitas- ok, but could've used a bit more seasoning/flavor.

Interesting wood sculptures upon entering were charming. Overall decor was nice. Saturday night, so a bit loud inside, though were seated in a section that wasn't too bad.

Service, though! Overall seemed responsive at first. I decided to split an appetizer and entree with my sister, and given different preferences and allergies had several requests like half cheese and half beans on the nachos, and NO sour cream. She didn't confirm the order, even though she appeared to write down no sour cream, and orders came with it on both as well as beans all over the nachos. Child's drink ordered first and didn't come until we asked about it. Eventually asked for the check and it was brought relatively quickly. However, then she failed to come back to get the payment for it, and I had to ask another employee to please get it to her so we could leave. Overall, disappointed by the service.

And the PRICES!!! Even the salads were over $22 each! I was completely SHOCKED at the prices charged for the level of quality and amount of food overall. Then there was the added peeve where their suggestion of % tip was based on the total including tax rather than the subtotal before tax, thus making it all a few bucks even more expensive if one didn't do the calculation.

Hence, 3...

The reason I'm giving this place one star is because the food was horrible. Beautiful restaurant. Great atmosphere and very nice staff. This was my first time here and I came specifically for breakfast because I heard they had great breakfast tacos. Actually, I know they had great breakfast tacos because my sister would bring me some home. Anyway, the barbacoa was not your typical barbacoa. It reminded me of pork skin. It was grey in color and not shredded up and tender. The refried beans had a lot of chopped onion in it which I didn't really care for. When I asked our waiter for a different order because the barbacoa was not their usual barbacoa, he admitted that they had changed the barbacoa. They no longer got it from the meat market and they made it there in the restaurant with left over pieces of meat. Meaning beef fat and whatever else. I appreciated his honesty. I really wanted to suggest that they go back to getting it from the market, but other people may actually like it. It just wasn't the typical barbacoa that I'm used to having. The papas that came on the breakfast plate were dry and had white stuff on it. Dried up flower is what it looked like. They were ok, but I wasn't impressed. I then ordered quesadillas because how can you go wrong with that, and the beef fajita was so tough. Their food was just all around different. Their chips, salsa, pan dulce, tortillas, and sopapillas were all delicious though. But this wasn't the texmex food that I...