Encanto Restaurant — Restaurant in Los Angeles

First of all, Encanto is a really nice restaurant, with a cozy yet chic atmosphere! I really enjoyed our waitress, whose name I’m so sad that I didn’t ask for, because she was amazing! She was super attentive and sweet, she even gave us some salsas to go.

However, the food left us hanging. We ordered the octopus/pulpo to start, which was a bit tough. Though, I can ignore that because the flavors were spot on! Highly recommend it regardless of it being a little overcooked for my taste.

My main was the pollo/chicken entree. It was meh…to say the least. The chicken itself was juicy, but the anchiote sauce was too salty and acidic for me. My family members ordered the taco trio (asada, pescado, y pollo) and they were also disappointed by their food. They tasted oddly lukewarm? Like they’d been sitting out there for a while. Especially the tortilla, it felt chewy and stale. Which was disappointing considering their price and the small portion size.

Honestly, my favorite part of the meal were the beans and rice sides (which were $10 extra, not included). The beans had a unique smoky flavor, and the rice completed it well! It was really the highlight of my meal. The cocktails were also nice, the espresso martini and the margarita are just the right strength for me. The guacamole and the salsas it came with were another goodie! The red salsa definitely one of my favorites along with the seriously addictive habanero one.

Overall, the vibes were definitely it! However the food is just ok, considering how pricey it is I expected something a little more tastier. I think it’s definitely a cool place to hang out and just get a few appetizers though! Personally, I would still love to come back, but probably not for...

We dined at Encanto on February 9, 2024. Everything was okay until I paid for our meals. The server handed me the card reader to sign and said “A 20% tip was added”. I assumed they meant the 20% gratuity fee already on the bill so I signed. I got a notification from my credit card app that showed the amount charged and noticed that an $84 tip had been added to the 20% already on the bill. I asked the server to refund me the extra $84 tip and explained that I was not aware of it when I signed. On February 14, I saw that my payment had gone through but there was no refund so I called the restaurant to ask if a manager could help issue the refund. The manager said they could, however, a couple of days later I still didn’t see anything in my account. I called again and the manager said it should be in my account within 2-3 business days. It’s now been 7 business days since I spoke to the manager and 12 days since asking the server to refund me and still, I have not received a refund.

(I feel it’s also important to note that I asked for a receipt after paying and the server never returned. I was only able to get the receipt once I went to ask for a refund and saw the receipt hanging from the printer.) Not sure if this is done deliberately to get more tips from customers but we ended up paying $168 in tips without meaning to. Overall, this has been a disappointing experience.

The server’s name is Johana C. The Manager with whom I spoke twice...

So, I'll start of by saying that I disagree with people saying that this place was too loud, or they got bad service. We found the ambience to be excellent, the vibe couldn't be any cooler, and service was good. The positives... Our waiter, Michael, was warm and welcoming, and made drink suggestions when they were out of the gin that I wanted for my Negroni. Drinks were excellent. The guacamole and dips with chips was the star of the show, and should be for almost $20. The negative comes in with the main course. We ordered Al Pastor fajitas, which we always order, and love. They came out pretty fast, but the pork was so dry and charred, that it was embarrassing for them. Like it had been sitting under a heat lamp for hours. We were absolutely starving from hiking down from Griffith Observatory, so we ate them, but left most of the inedible veggies, which had a very weird flavor. I told the waiter, and he was nice enough about it, but had told us that they were his favorite on the menu. At $52, that should have been the star of the show, and they were horrible. Maybe it was a bad night, but very disappointed spending that much money for less than Taco...