Las Caleñas — Restaurant in Katy

The restaurant was nothing fancy, but nice. The staff was pleasant and helpful. This was our first visit and there was 5 of us. There was only a handful of people seated when we arrived. It took about 5 minutes for staff to come to the table, she gave us menus, but didn't take a drink order. She came back about 5 minutes later and took our food, drink and appetizer order all at once. About 20 minutes later another waitress showed up and gave us complementary empanadas due to the delay. About 20 minutes after that we got our food. The food looked very good, was hot and most importantly tasted very good. When our split checks came there was 18% gratuity added to the checks which is common for large parties, but there was only 5 of us. Then when we paid, our cards were run for the amount which included the gratuity and given a check that had the usual area for a Tip as if one had not already been charged without our consent. Needless to say I struck a line through it to avoid another tip being added and signed it. I seldom leave less than 20% tip, and only If the wait staff service was really poor or rude. I would have left a 20% because despite the long wait, the food was really good. However, I find the practice of adding mandatory gratuity to my bill and charging it to my card without my approval bad business. I particularly find it deceitful when I'm then given a receipt with an empty gratuity line as if a tip had not already been charged.

The 3 star rating is for the 40 minute wait to get our food and what I percieve as a deceitful business practice with the gratuity. However, I will give credit where due and the food was very good. I will definitely try this place again and update my review, hopefully with a better experience. If management reads this and cares, I urge you to change your current gratuity charge practice, people will tip you based on good service...

They have only one waiter, who seems to have little knowledge about waiting tables. He does not know being nice and pleasing customers is the key to better clientele and tips. I asked him to give me some more sauce for my “Papas guisadas o chorreadas”, and he ignored me. Sauce for Papas guisadas/chorreadas should be more liquid, with mozzarella cheese, sour cream, and cilantro, which they don’t use. Those papas are rather dry. They don’t know the right recipe.

They also need to learn from fine restaurants, where they offer you to serve more sauce, chips, or bread, according to their treat, as many times as desired, even without asking. Mexican restaurants are checking all the time to make sure you have plenty of sauce and chips, throughout the entire dinner. Not this restaurant: they are stingy. They won’t give you a little more sauce, even if you ask for it. BAD, BAD SERVICE. I still wonder if it is the waiter or the cooks making those decisions, because a good manager would never pass...

This place was super yummy. I got some chicharon and empanadas. I like the Hawaiian ones even if they aren't Columbian. The seabass looked super yummy and we ordered it but the owner was so caught up on offering me to try one of the soups he forgot to put it in. Lol so we left after just eating appetizers. I was already full of appetizers and soup samples so we just paid for the food we ordered and left. Nobody's fault they just went above and beyond to let me try something else so it slipped his mind. I didn't even tell them they forgot but we were like surely they didn't go catch the fish haha. If I wasn't being catered to so hard it wouldn't have slipped. Now I have something to...