Social Cantina — Restaurant in Mishawaka

Social Cantina Review: Good Ingredients, Inconsistent Execution

The Positive: The staff at Social Cantina were excellent - friendly, knowledgeable, and attentive. The restaurant was very clean throughout, including the bathrooms, which is always appreciated.

The Issues: The experience started on a disappointing note when we were served water in plastic cups that had visible spots and felt sticky. For the prices they charge, real glassware would be more appropriate.

The Yucca "Social Fries" Fiasco The Appetizer "Yucca Fries" ($11.00)—or should I say, the Nine Fries with Three Tiny Sauces. They were crispy, well-seasoned, and pretty delicious... but eleven dollars for nine fries? Even with inflation, that’s highway robbery. At that price, I should at least get enough to share without laughing. A sad excuse for an appetizer. They are called "Social Fries" on the menu as if to indicate that it's an appetizer to share, but it's not, it is a snack, not a real appetizer IMHO. Real Value $5.99 on a good day, maybe.

Dinner Time

Pork Belly Korean BBQ Taco ($5.25 each): The 3 Bite Taco! The taco had great potential with its juicy pork belly, tasty BBQ glaze, and crunchy sweet onion slaw.

However, the tortilla was completely un-toasted and limp The toppings were just piled on and served lukewarm. They did serve it with a small lime wedge, but no pico, no shred, nothing on the plate that would indicate any value to the overpriced 3-bite meal.

While the flavors were good, the heavy sauce application overwhelmed other elements.

At $5.25 per taco, I expected better execution and presentation. Some simple improvements, like toasting the tortilla or adding a garnish, would make a big difference. If you are going to serve an extremely small 3-bite taco, make those the best 3 bites they've ever tasted. Serve it hot, make it delicious, don't over-sauce it, add something to the plate, a small pico slaw, or a side sauce, or chips are cheap, maybe a few tortia chips with a sauce to add something to the plate that doesnt say, you got a 3 bite taco and we got you to pay $5.25 for that.

Atmosphere: Falling Apart (Literally) The dining area was a room that was enclosed but outside, maybe it's a temporary room, it had seen better days. We were initially seated under a wobbly pole sticking out of the wall—so loose that we moved ourselves to another table to avoid potential disaster. Not exactly the vibe you want when you’re paying premium prices.

Final Verdict: Needs Serious Adjustments There’s potential here—the flavors are solid, and the staff is great—but Social Cantina is cutting too many corners for what they’re charging. Either lower the prices, increase the portions, or put real effort into presentation. Right now, it feels like they’re banking on trendiness over substance.

(Like all my reviews, we will try them again in a few weeks to see if they have made any...

This is the second time here. I looked online for the menu earlier in the day, so I had an idea of what I wanted and noticed they had Happy Hour drinks and food.

When we arrived, they seated us quickly and right across from the bar.

The server came to take our drink order, and I inquired about the specials. One was a Mexican beer on draft for $3, a pitcher of margaritas for $25, and the other was the guava margarita for $5.

I chose the guava while my cousin asked for iced tea. They arrived quickly, and we asked for more time to look at the menu. Again, I asked if they had happy hour specials.

This time, he brought me a menu with the specials. I wish they would have given us those when we first sat down.

Food specials were Quesadilla with chicken tinga, cheese, pico and avocado ranch Spring rolls and Happy Hour Social Nachos with tortilla chips, white queso, roasted corn and poblano, pico de gallo, diced jalapeños, adobo crema, tomatillo crema, social spice. Apps are $6 each.

I chose the Nachos and the Quesadillas to go with my Margarita. My cousin chose the Esquites with street corn served off the cob, chipotle aioli, cotija cheese, cilantro, tortilla chips and the Shrimp and Street Corn Tacos with fried shrimp, sriracha crema, esquites corn, queso fresco, cilantro (tacos were on special for $3 each).

As we sat and talked, waiting for the food, the place started to fill up as it was getting close to 5pm.

Our food arrived about 15 minutes later and everything was wonderful. My nachos had thinly sliced jalapeno, and the cheese was slightly spicy, which I didn't mind. The quesadilla I didn't even touch since I ate the nachos and saved the quesadilla for lunch the next day.

I ordered another guava margarita when the server returned to check on us. The restaurant can get loud when it fills up due to the interior with high ceilings. Kinda of an industrial look.

It's nice to sit outside on warm days. They have a patio in the front, and depending on your choice of seats, you can see the river walk. It's a great area, and sometimes you can hear the bands playing when you are on the patio.

Overall, I love this place. My bill with 2 margarita's, nachos, and quesadillas was $33, of which I have a...

Went with 3 friends to celebrate a birthday. The waitress was nice, but not attentive whatsoever, forgetting about us several times and even admitting to doing so in her apologies to us. We ordered the large Social Chips and Salsa for like $20 and the big margarita pitcher.

After waiting probably 30 minutes the chips came out completely over seasoned and mostly crumbs (which, from reading other reviews I suppose is "just how they come"). The salsas tasted awful and the queso was just ok, which for the price is pretty disappointing. Oh, and the margaritas were weak, too.

We were there at least an hour before the waitress even asked us if we wanted to order entrees, and then another 45m to an hour for them to arrive (bear in mind, it was not busy), and when they did arrive they were room temperature. The meat in my burrito didn't look cooked very well at all, and I probably would've found more flavor if I had just stayed home and asked Chat GPT to describe a burrito, printed out the description on typing paper and bit into it.

My instincts from working in foodservice tell me this was probably just a bad night from the wait staff to the cooks, but usually in those cases there's at least one redeeming quality to the experience. That night there were none, so once we shoveled down what parts of the flavorless food looked safe to eat we decided to grab our checks and never come back.

I usually don't post reviews, and I'm not a diva about restaurants either, but this was the worst dining experience I've had in a long time. Think they put too much effort into being trendy and cool and forgot to Google how to make...