Orale Mexican Kitchen — Restaurant in Morristown

Orale was "meh" - the atmosphere was great but the food and price point were just a bit disappointing.

SERVICE: 10/10 for friendliness and for a very polite server, however... 5/10 for the amount of wait staff that CONSTANTLY came over to clean our table, ask us if we wanted anything else, etc. It was SUPER overwhelming. As soon as you were done with your plate, someone was there to take it away. Had an empty drink - someone came immediately to remove it from your table. It was honestly way too much checking in. We didn't even take a bite of our meals and our waitress had come over to ask how it was... It seemed like they just wanted you to eat and get out.

FOOD: 3/10 | Eat My Guac tasting of 3: we had chosen the following as our 3: 1. Guacamole Casa, 2. Camaron, 3. El Naco. All 3 really lacked any sort of flavor. Their basic guacamole needed some sort of acid or salt with it. The pork belly on the El Naco was soggy and not crispy, and the shrimp looked like they would've had the most flavor and nothing.

2/10 | Machin Tacos: the flavor was OK, but the taco was filled with cabbage and barely any crispy pork belly (again, which was not crispy). I was also super disappointed because the description of the tacos was "roasted bone marrow" - so I thought I would've been able to eat the bone marrow. To my surprise, the bone marrow was hallowed out and there was nothing in the bones. Your tacos basically came on top of the empty bone marrow bones. So you pay $23 for cabbage tacos.

5/10 | Carnitas: these weren't bad, but not a ton of flavor. The tacos mind you are very small and don't come with much meat, it's mostly the other fillers.

DRINKS: 10/10 | Watermelon: this was the best thing we had while we dined. There was a great hint of watermelon and it was a light and refreshing drink. The only "confusing" part was that there was a little watermelon candy attached to the drink, which was cute, but we couldn't figure out of you were supposed to eat or drop it into the drink? It was interesting to eat it on it's own - it was salty and then spicy once you got to the middle and tasted like a Now and Later candy?

Overall, I wouldn't return. It was a cool vibe but other than that, the restaurant was extremely disappointing in the lack of flavor in their food, and the portion of the proteins in their tacos - they definitely use the less expensive ingredients to fill their tacos/appetizers. For the price, they need to reevaluate what they're giving you in terms of protein in the...

Below is my OpenTable review/interaction:

Overall just had a bad experience for the second time.

Drinks and food were good everything else was terrible. They wouldn’t make the smallest accommodation for someone with an allergy.

Orale Mexican Kitchen - Morristown Public Hi Eduardo,

We are very sorry you feel this way, we did make several accommodations for the group as we pride ourselves on an exceptional level of hospitality. The only accommodation we were unwilling to make was for you to bring outside food in for dinner. We do apologize that this did not meet your standards.

Eduardo responded:

That is very untrue.

Some of us arrived earlier than our reservation, asked if we could order happy hour drinks, and were told we couldn’t unless we ordered an entree first. We said we didn’t want to order entrees before the rest of the party arrived but still we were not allowed to order.

When it came time to order, we asked if we could order the enchilada without the sauce because my mother-in-law can not eat spicy food (she gets very ill) and we were told we could not. The first server told us the chef won’t make it because of the “presentation” and the second server told us we couldn’t because essentially it wouldn’t be an enchilada anymore.

We have been to several Mexican restaurants and we were allowed to make that accommodation for her without an issue.

The last effort to have her enjoy dinner with us was to allow her to grab pasta from another restaurant and she was given a buttered pasta alternative. She was insulted and felt like she was being treated like a 3 year old.

Those were the only accommodations we asked for and were denied. So I’m not sure what “several” accommodations were made.

Both times we came we spent over $1,000 and basic accommodations weren’t met.

I appreciate your response, my review was simply to share my experience.

In Response to the most recent response from the Owner:

We arrived early and were seated with out a problem (the dining area was completely empty, we were literally the only table in the dining area). Your response still did not show the several accommodations that were made. It, in fact, solidifies my review. If we were unable to be seated before our party, we would have simply waited the 90 minutes we had at another restaurant.

While we appreciate being seated “earlier”, the purpose of us getting there earlier was to enjoy happy hour which we...

Edited in response to reply below:

Thank you for responding, but your message unfortunately misrepresents what actually happened.

We arrived around 6 PM on Saturday -- early by most standards -- and contrary to the claim of a "busy night," the restaurant was more than half empty. There were plenty of open tables, including a shaded one directly next to ours, which remained vacant during our entire visit. We kindly asked to be moved out of the scorching sun, especially considering we were with our two small children, but our request was denied -- without any attempt to accommodate us, rearrange umbrellas, or "adjust the setup" as you now claim.

As for the interaction with your manager: it was not an attempt to "understand our concerns." He approached us after our meal while we were preparing to leave and started the conversation with: "You left us a bad review." There was no interest in listening or resolving anything -- only to reprimand us for sharing our experience. That's not service, it's intimidation.

To be clear: diners have every right to share their honest experience, at any time -- even while still at the restaurant -- without being publicly mischaracterized or privately confronted. We didn't come in with unreasonable demands. We just expected a bit of empathy, flexibility, and professionalism -- and received none.

Initial Review: I rarely leave negative reviews, but this experience was truly disappointing. We were seated outside in the scorching sun with no umbrella or shade, despite there being an empty shaded table literally right next to us. When we asked to be moved, the staff refused without explanation, even though it would've been an easy and reasonable accommodation.

What made things worse was the behavior of the restaurant manager. As we were preparing to leave, he confronted us aggressively for leaving a "bad review" -- something we hadn't even done yet at that point. It was rude, unprofessional, and frankly, shocking. Rather than apologize or try to understand why we were uncomfortable, he doubled down and made an already poor experience feel downright hostile.

We came here expecting a relaxed meal and good hospitality -- we got neither. There are plenty of great Mexican restaurants in town that treat their guests with respect and kindness. This isn't...