Don Julio Authentic Mexican Restaurant — Restaurant in Lino Lakes

My husband and I live in Stacy and frequent the Don Julios in Forest Lake and North Branch often but because my husband worked all day in Lino Lakes we stopped by this location. We showed up around 8pm on a Sunday night and were seated quickly and ordered our drinks while we looked over the menu. We have favorites from the same menu at other locations so we ordered the Pina Vallarta and the Don Julio. Soon after I requested the cheese dip for the chips and we sat and waited. Quite awhile passed and still no cheese dip so my husband flagged down the bust boy and requested it again. The bust boy brought our food and the cheese dip. My husband noticed he didn't get the tortillas with his Pina Vallarta and so the bust boy went and grabbed our server, Luis.The server told my husband that it didn't come with tortillas. My husband said he has been ordering this meal for years and it has always came with corn tortillas. The waiter argued again and said that it doesn't but he can put in an order for tortillas. We were brought our tortillas and that was last we seen of anyone. No one checked on our food, offered my husband another beer, came with a check, nothing. I proceeded to get up after finishing and waiting for a long time and found our waiter and told him we felt like we were forgotten about and needed boxes and our check. He threw his hands up and explained that his family was there and grabbed our boxes. I said we have always been treated very well at other locations and was very disappointed we were left around a corner and forgotten about. There was one other table with the waiters family and a couple at the bar. 2 waiters and bust boy couldn't finish serving us? Our waiter, Luis, repeated how his family was there like that made ignoring us okay. I asked for a manager and Luis said the manager wasn't there but I could come back tomorrow to see him and kept repeating that he was a big guy. ??? His attitude and how he handled our complaint was very disappointing so I will be calling to complain to management tomorrow and decided to write...

I believe the food I had was not the best represention of what they have or that I might have just ordered something they don't do well.

I come from California and know good Mexican, this was worse than taco bell.

I ordered the bean burrito, enchilada, and quesadilla.

First of all they didn't include beans in my bean burrito and only cheese, I think they misunderstood me when I asked to add cheese. But they put so much in it, it was pretty gross.

They remade this for me and I was also disappointed in the remake. Everything tasted canned none of the food tasted fresh. Absolutely nothing was special about the food. Not the beans, the sauce, the tortilla. You can get this exact meal at any random hole in the wall Mexican restaurant and have it taste the exact same. The cheese tasted like pre shredded cheese. Nothing was fresh.

The service was not that great. My server was okay, but the other bartenders saw me make eye contact with them and they continued to ignore me even when I said something. It wasn't busy, they were training... But they didn't do this once to me but three times. I felt I could have been on and out faster if the attention to the customer was more alert. I also have a background in the food industry, you don't ignore customers like that.

The ambiance is much better than the food and service. And it was at least clean.

The bathroom was very clean...

We visited this location recently on a Saturday evening. We were a larger party of 11 - I do recognize that larger parties are more work. However, the service was incredibly slow. It took forever to get our order in. We had ordered waters for everyone and a few people ordered margaritas. I know margaritas take a while to make, our order could have been taken in the meantime. After waiting 15-20 minutes to order, I finally asked if we could get our order in. Again, I know it takes a while to prepare all that food, but it took SO long for the food to come out. People were getting their fajitas but no tortillas and they waited several minutes to get their tortillas. The chips were thick and stale tasting. They were not good. We had a couple folks ask for hot salsa. Some restaurants charge for this and some don't. This restaurant does - we didn't ask if it would be extra and they didn't say it would be extra, so just be forewarned when you ask for things. We needed to go boxes, which again take forever. This entire visit took 2 to 2 and a half hours, which is WAY too long for this type of restaurant. Nobody at the table raved about their dishes, it was either mediocre or not great. For the food alone, I won't be visiting again. I don't know if what we experienced was abnormal or if...