Los Agaves Mexican Grill — Restaurant in Iowa City

First of all, I don't understand how this place has such high reviews. I am assuming most of this city has never eaten anything with flavor, nor had GOOD Tex-Mex in their entire lives. I understand this part of the country is a flavor desert.. however, when I go off of reviews, I should know better considering most people in this part of the country think black-pepper is SPICY.

Let me start off by saying when I pulled up I was pretty excited. Full parking lot, pretty good sign for lunch-time. We enter & are promptly seated, our waiter was pretty nice. A woman behind us told us this was THE BEST Mexican restaurant in Iowa City. Made our order, received our food & that's when the trouble began.

My Carnitas plate was DRY.. like JERKY dry. I could count on my hands how much tomato was in my pico.. I had 7 cubes of roma tomatoes in my pico de gallo. I stole some sour cream from my husband's plate to moisten it a little on my tortilla I was building to eat. I ask the waiter to bring me a little more pico. He asked if I wanted a SIDE of pico. I explained, no, I want more pico than was put on my lunch plate. I did not want to pay EXTRA for enough pico for my lunch.. The waiter gave me a nasty look & walked away.

Frustrated & without eating our food my husband decided it was time to leave. The waiter noticed & followed "You have to pay your bill!" We replied telling him the food was unacceptable & the waiter told us to wait while he got the manager. We waited at the front & explained our unhappiness with the food to the manager & tells us "It's lunch portions." The manager then builds us the receipt & tells us we need to pay for our food. No offer to accommodate us with something else on the menu, no willingness to compensate us in any way. My husband had to TELL the manager he wasn't paying for food he didn't eat & they threw attitude towards us.

Worst Mexican Restaurant in Iowa City & some of the worst customer service in the food industry I've ever encountered,

Not that my review matters at the end of the day, needless to say we'll never be back. I'm sure the staff is...

I opted to eat here because I was with a party of friends and I’ve picked people up from here a few times while I drove ride share. We were greeted outside by the hostesses who were laughing and holding the door open. My first sight was seeing white wrappings littered along the sidewalk up to the door.

We ordered and the food came on hot plates and the presentation was what you would expect from a mexican restaurant (overly garnished). My food was warm at best and had absolutely no flavor. The beef was not seasoned and very runny and bland enchilada sauce. This “burrito deluxe” was something I’d expect from Taco Bell. Infact that would give Taco Bell a bad name and for $14-18 a plate? The server came once to ask how our food was as if she knew the place sucked.

As Hispanics they should stop with the enabling of sensitive American tongues and cook like they would as if they were actually serving food that could be called authentic. I will not be returning and those wrappers? Cheap peppermints given at the end for thank you for over...

We are regulars here! I dare say every two weeks we do takeout from Los Agaves because it's that delicious and consistent.

Ordering over the phone is quick and efficient, the food is always ready to go in 15 minutes. They tell you which parking space to pull into when you arrive, and half the time they bring it out to me without me having to call them back to let them know I've arrived.

I jump around the menu a bit: street tacos are yummy (but I usually get those for dine-in) carnitas are fantastic and could easily be shared/two meals Yucatan or Pollo Sonora are other go to options for me. Santa Fe Quesadilla—I recently ordered this and it might be my new favorite as it has plenty of veggies, steak, and the cheese is perfect and melty. The tortilla is delicious too.

My husband loves the Pollo Monterrey.

My kiddos love the side of cheese quesadillas—I swear they are the best in town.

We don't dine in often and it's been a while, but I've never had an issue with service...