Valencia’s Tex-Mex Garage — Restaurant in Houston

Visited for the first time last night. Lively atmosphere and vibrant decor that really defines the personality of the place. Husband and I started out with the Queso Fundido which is cheese, chorizo, and some other fixins in a small skillet. Since they make their own flour and corn tortillas we decided to try them both. The tortillas and queso were very good. A bit pricey for two at $11 but split amongst three or more people it would be a fine appetizer. We both ordered regular size (read "small") frozen margaritas. Seems like they were about $11 each. Taste-wise they were fine. Perfectly average margaritas. However, considering they were watery and not completely frozen they were a big disappointment. I had the Queso Del Mar enchiladas with shrimp. They were tasty. I really liked the black bean soup. My husband had the Superior dinner. He thought it was OK. The issue with our entrees was that they were not hot. Food should be served with steam coming off the food when served. Instead, our food was merely warm. Thus, I have every reason to assume the food was merely scooped out of a warm pan and onto our plates. Unacceptable. Instead, our food was merely warm. I will say that our waiter was attentive regularly visited our table but not to the point of being an annoyance. I drink a lot of water when eating and I really appreciate not having to ask for my glass of water to be refilled, so this was very much appreciated. One last thing: with concrete floors and the design of the restaurant, it was difficult to have a conversation because the restaurant is just too noisy. We tired from trying to have normal conversation and ended up retreating to our respective phones rather than having to raise our voices. We're not hard of hearing in general, either. The taste of the food was good but the absurdity of our two-person meal costing in excess of $70 (tip was additional), the food being served warm, not hot, the watery margaritas, and the difficulty of having a normal conversation due to the noisiness of the establishment made the experience an overall disappointment. Houston, Texas, is home to countless outstanding Tex-Mex restaurants that serve equal or better food for less and serve it at the right temperature. Because of that we have no desire to return to this restaurant. However, we...

BE AWARE!!! WORSE EXPERIENCE!! COPS INVOLVED!! We were celebrating my mom’s birthday, but we were robbed of our excitement and our experience to enjoy good food with family. My dad and I asked for a table of 15, and I already knew from the manager’s demeanor he was STRESSED OUT. However, we dealt with it and waited to be seated. Some guests came late which is always expected, but they were able to place their order quickly. It took close to a hour for their food to come out, and I remember my mom’s friend saying she was going to cancel their food since some people were finish eating. She also ask the waiter how much longer and he said 5 minutes. It took 5 minutes, but he dropped the entire tray of food with 5 entrées. They cancel their food because they thought it would take another hour, but when the waiter ensured to them it would not they told him to remake the food. The restaurant have a POLICY that they can only split bills 3 ways. Therefore, the guests that came late were automatically on the same bill, but it was 2 different families on one bill. One family spoke for themselves and told the waiter if one of their entree could be half off, and he granted it. When the other family found out they thought it was unfair that he dropped their food too, but he did not take half off their entree. When this was brought to the manager’s attention he treated the situation so poorly by treating two families completely different. He did not budge with the other family who was on the same bill and whose food was dropped as well, and unfortunately they had to pay 100% of their bill. To resolve this issue the COPS were called on us and it was very embarrassing. We also had staff filming us who were completely unaware of the scenario saying we did not want to pay $12. We paid over $500 close to $600 as a table, it was about the principle rather than money. In my opinion, it takes a special person to not budge after hearing from 8 different voices he is wrong. The manager is not only prideful, but lacks customer service and empathy for others. Owners please be careful who you hire to manage your business. If I was the manger $12 would have came out of my “personal pocket”...

This was my second time coming here. The first time I came for my birthday the server was amazing and made sure our mimosa glasses were never empty. This time I came, our initial server was Felix. If you get him as your server it is in your best interest to request a new one or just leave. Felix told us our mimosa limit was 1 until we ordered food. Which didn’t make any sense if we were paying for the penny ones. He knew we were waiting for 3 more people to show up. We ordered an appetizer as well. We got the queso that comes with the tortillas. Which I would also advise strongly against, because it comes out as poorly melted shredded cheese that is super greasy and you can’t even dip a chip or tortilla in jt. I had to cut it with a knife. I informed and showed Felix this to which his response was well you ordered it so idk the problem. Once our other people arrived they told him they would also like mimosas, he also limited them to one until we all ordered. So once they knew what they wanted we all ordered. I attempted to order a taco with a flour tortilla instead of corn and he told me I wasn’t able to do that, but when another person in my party ordered a taco he told them they could choose between flour or corn. After the remainder of my party saw how Felix was treating the table we requested a new server. We all had empty mimosa glasses, no chips, no salsa, he was not filling waters or even checking in the table. Leslie was sent to us and saved the day. He made sure the rest of our visit was amazing, he was always making sure we had everything we needed and that everything came out okay. Our mimosa glasses and waters were never empty. Overall, I don’t know if I would come back since the service is hit or miss, but I am glad we were able to switch servers to at least make sure the end of our meal was great, even if we were outside constantly being...