Te Amo Tequila Bar & Tacos — Restaurant in New Haven

Saturday 6/29/24, I made a reservation for 5 for night dining at Te Amo. Upon booking with open table, they gave a 15 minute grace period for reservations. When we arrived, the manager Kevin let me know our table was given away. It was 10 minutes after the reservation time, and Kevin stated they do not abide by OpenTable guidelines so we had to wait for another table. Which was fine because our table party grew to 7 and they did accommodate us fairly quick. My one star of service is for that.

When we were seated with our server Kelly, we ordered a margarita pitcher and 7 green tea shots to celebrate a birthday at the table. This was at 1015pm, our food came around 1030 pm. We saw pitchers being made at the bar and cranked out every 2-5 minutes, we asked Kelly repeatedly where ours was and she stated that the bar was backed up. We didn’t receive our margarita pitcher until 1108pm. Everyone had already eaten, so with full stomachs, nobody touched the pitcher. So around 1130pm we asked Kelly for our check. She went missing for about an hour. Kevin, the manger, asked if we were okay and I did tell him about the discrepancy with our margarita pitcher and he said they comped it. At 1220am Kelly came over and asked if we were ready for our shots. We were all confused because we ordered them almost 2 hours ago, and also everyone was ready to go at this point. Kevin the manager came in and interjected and said condescendingly “I asked if you guys were okay, you need to tell me what’s going on not her if I’m coming and asking you something.” I told him, we took care of this with the server and he rudely said, “NO, I’m the manger AND the server, you ask ME”. I’ve never had to ask a server AND a manager at the same time for anything at a restaurant but Kevin insisted that this is how Te Amo is now ran. Kevin brought the shots over as Kelly slammed the shot glasses onto the table. At this point, the night was soiled. We then also had to ask for our bill again. It was around 1240am at this point. We were given one bill for $170 for the 7 of us to split, then Kelly came over and handed us a new bill for $230 for all of us. I still don’t know where this difference of amount came from.

When leaving, I asked the wonderful bartender Nick what the managers name was and the manager screamed “It’s KEVIN! You don’t have to ask anyone else about me”.

I’ve been dining at Te Amo for years. Solo, with dates, with groups, and the food has always been subpar. 4/10 on a good day but the drinks and the vibes are immaculate. I’ve never experienced such a rude manager, a careless server and overall tasteless customer service. To DEMAND to a customer that it is mandatory to ask the restaurant manager AND the server for the same things in order to receive good service is very strange to me. This closes my chapter of dining at Te Amo. It’s unfortunate but I hope no other parties or patrons experience the negative energy and condescending dialogue...

I never write reviews, but I had a terrible experience at this place and honestly think you can find better dine in options than this.

A good friend of mine met up for their happy hour on Saturday 11/12. The place was fairly packed and after being seated we weren’t approached until 10 minutes later by the manager to put in a drink order. No big deal, my friend and I are enjoying our conversation and in no rush. It isn’t until another 10 min later that our waitress stops by our table to drop off water and she lets us know they’re busy and she’ll be back in 2 minutes. Again, we told her it was fine and that she can take her time getting back to us. She didn’t come back to our table until another 10 min later, when she asked if we were ready to order and I asked for the shrimp tacos. She asks “which” to then I respond “I only saw the fajita shrimp, what are the other options?” The waitress immediately with an attitude goes “sweetie, I don’t have time to tell you about the shrimp options. I’ll come back when you’re ready to order.” And leaves us alone for another 10 minutes. She didn’t even wait to hear me say “fajita shrimp is fine” because at this point I didn’t want to wait even longer to put in an order. My friend and I were left to sit there and both agreed that was unnecessarily rude to say and honestly ruined the atmosphere. I understand you have a busy night with other tables but if you can’t spare a customer 2-3 minutes max to explain what kind of shrimp you have on your tacos, should I not to expect my waitress to be able to provide an answer for me? Dinner arrived, food was OK (the Baja shrimp tacos were underwhelming but the nachos weren’t terrible), drinks were a good bang for your buck but after that initial interaction along with the minimal service we received after, it solidified that I will not be coming back here. I talked to the manager at the front of house that day to let him know my experience and he was extremely apologetic about it and said he hopes I come back in the future. Sadly I did not get any names as by this point I was ready to leave and didn’t think I would leave a review. But because this used to be my friend’s favorite go to spot and one of the first to show up when you look up happy hour in New Haven, I just wanted to share the experience I had.

I would recommend their sister restaurant Barracuda for a more positive experience- also has great customer service, delicious food, solid happy hour, and a warm and...

Went there with a party of 18 + people to celebrate a birthday. We had reservations for 8p.m. since we got there everyone in our party was spending money Nonstop. The place was packed then something I had never seen before happened to us. The manager had her waitresses take tables and chairs from us every time some of our family or friends got up to dance or use the bathroom. We told the staff multiple times that we were still occupying the tables assigned to us through our reservations. The manager or Coowner insisted on taking our tables or chairs everytime one of us got up so she can give them to people that got there after us so they can sit and eat. To top it off my family and I have been supporting Sonia since Barracudas (their other restaurant) for years. Have sent lots of business their way since their beginning. Gotta say that we were super disappointed and 1 will never speak good about them again. And 2 probably will never patron either establishment again. Our Money or business was not appreciated even after our endless support of them for the past few years so we ended up taking our whole crew and capped the night around the block over at Pacifico

s. The place was awesome. Drinks, music and ambience was on point. Once management knew we were celebrating a birthday they made sure the B~day girl felt special. Thanks to them the night was saved and added to our book of epic nights. Te Amo Tequila can most certainly learn some better management and customer service skills. Not a good place to go celebrate a special day nor go with a big group of people. Obviously now that they are expanding and got bigger, loyalty to longtime customers means nothing to them. Shame that some people get this way when they see themselves growing. Anyways! Pacifico