Del Taco — Restaurant in Mesa

I will start by saying that my husband and I have frequented this location many many times in the past year and have typically had pretty good experiences - decent quality food for a good price.

However, my experience there last night left me so frustrated that I will likely never return without evidence of corrective action taken by management. I pulled in to the drive through at 9:10 PM yesterday, Taco Tuesday, planning to place a small order of the 3 for $1 tacos. I was 3rd in line. After waiting a good 10 minutes - shame on me - I noticed the same car was still at at the ordering kiosk. I figured there was some sort of mechanical error with the ordering system or they were making a very complicated/indecisive order.

I decided to park and go inside instead. I walked in and was second in line, one other person waiting for their food. There were at least 5 employees behind the counter and every one of them seemed like they were in middle school - both by appearance and behavior. The girl taking orders was continually distracted and took several minutes to finish taking the order of the one person in front of me - a simple order of 12 hard and 12 soft tacos. Once I ordered - 6 hardshell tacos (the special of the day) and a strawberry lemonade, I stepped aside to wait. Several other people ordered after me.

In the TWENTY MINUTES waiting for my food I observed: --everyone who ordered after me receiving their food, despite a very loud, immature argument between several employees about what goes into a certain salad and what type of cheese is "jack cheese" --at least one person who went through the drive through having something not given to them as well as part of their order not even recorded --continuous shoving, laughing and banter between employees - beyond the normal rapport and more like middle school flirtation and distraction --a discussion about how my order was never even recorded and therefore one of the boys behind the counter claiming he could not make it until it was in the computer

In this entire time, I was not even given my drink, which took a whole 5 seconds for the girl to prepare once she finally had my tacos on the counter - and she almost gave my drink away to another person. There was no one in the store who acted like a manager or shift leader, no one to keep the behavior of these kids in check, no one acting professionally. I was not even apologized to for my long wait to get the most basic food that I would have thought they'd anticipate preparing hundreds of given it was the special of the day. I finally left at 9:45 - 35 minutes after first pulling up.

Sidenote: not that this was in the control of the store, but I was on my way home from a 14 hour shift at the hospital and wanting to get home to my infant son ASAP to feed him before he went to sleep. That is the reason I did not leave sooner or request to speak to someone right away about the issue. I did not walk out without my food because I had told my sister I would come home with dinner. That is why I picked a fast food place. With this rate of service I might as well have gone to a sit down restaurant.

To add insult to injury, when I arrived home with the food, we found that half of our tacos had a pathetic amount of meat in them....

What can one say about a single location of a chain restaurant like Del Taco besides: a. They always get my order right (which they do) b. The employees have a great grasp of the English language (which they do)

Well, I can testify that this particular Del Taco made one of my wildest pubescent dreams come true.

It's like this... what teenage boy hasn't mused that if he had a pair of ta-tas, he'd keep himself amused for hours. I was no different.

Then somewhere in my twenties, Del Taco came strolling into my life, with their thick and creamy strawberry shakes, made with a generous helping of real fruit! The key to my youthful desire lied within this sweet polar potion... it was called lipids... aka milk fat.

Let me tell you friends, the grass isn't always greener. I'm not amused... not at all. There's nothing alluring about a tufted teat. They bounce; they sag; and they can percolate perspiration like Michael Vick at a PETA rally in Death Valley... on a really hot day.

And no one seems to care. Seinfeld conceptualized the 'manzier', but I've yet to see one for sale.

I'd have to say my lowest point came while at a water park with friends, one of which brought their new baby. While relaxing in a lounge chair under the awning by the wave pool, they asked if I wanted to hold little Abigail. Sure, I love kids.

As I was sitting there with this little cutie, I noticed other people were gawking at me. When I looked down to check on Abby, I noticed that her mouth was firmly latched on to my right mammary.

That's right children, come suckle daddy's sugarball.

My nonchalant extrication efforts didn't pan out, and the worst part was that I thought I felt seepage. With pretty much nothing left to lose, I wedged my left index finger between my swollen nip and lil-miss-hoover's mouth until I heard decompression.

Baby-go-back-to-Mama.

In conclusion, I'd like to think there's a lesson here we can all learn...

I went here because I was told they now had Beyond Meat on their menu.  I practice a mostly plant-based diet so I was interested in a splurge meal.  However, I am also celiac and needed something gluten free.  Going on the Del Taco website showed that their hard corn taco shells were gluten free so this was perfect!  My kids acquiesced to try the Beyond Meat (they practice an omnivorous diet) so off we went!  I had the Beyond Meat hard taco with no cheese and the kids shared a Beyond Meat burrito with fries in it (or something like that, I can't remember).  I really enjoyed my taco; the single taco was enough to fill me up, it was EXTREMELY flavorful and I presume it tasted like taco meat.  My kids liked their meal as well and though they were weary about the "meat-like crumbles", liked the flavor and would eat it again no problem.

The downside here was that the employees were not knowledgeable about their own product.  When I asked what was gluten free and what wasn't, they had no idea and didn't know where to check.  I was lucky that I did my own research, but I like to ask anyway.  I was actually told, "I don't know, I just ring it up".  So I let them know they needed to take extra precautions in preparing a gluten free taco--which was all news to them.  Also, the pricing for these items was a lot.  Now, I don't eat out much, so I don't really have a basis of comparison.  I could see that what we ordered was similarly priced to other items on the Del Taco menu, but it was still quite a bit for a single fast food meal.  Maybe Del Taco is on the more expensive side?

All in all, the food was good and, as previously stated, extremely flavorful.  For someone like me, who derives a lot of food flavor from the food itself and not from the seasonings, it was a bit much.  But I'd eat it again on great occasion.  My kids, however, would choose it everyday.  So...