Casa Enrique — Restaurant in New York

DO NOT COME HERE. CRIMINAL SERVICE - STAFF FORGOT TO SERVE A DISH AND TRIED TO GASLIGHT US INTO PAYING FOR IT ANYWAYS

Decided to try this spot with my girlfriend after moving to Long Island City recently and hearing this spot was a reasonably priced Michelin Star (no longer in 2024) restaurant. Watched the Eater video beforehand and was excited to try a couple of items on the menu.

Overall, the food was pretty mediocre. We got the Guacamole to start (5/10 - pretty standard, nothing special), Al Pastor Tacos (5/10 - Tasted fine but again, nothing to write home about. Relatively small and pricey for what you get), Chicken Mole Enchiladas (7/10 - Best dish we got. Mole was pretty tasty), Tres Leches Cake (4/10 - way too sweet). We shared a frozen strawberry margarita which was actually probably the best thing we got here (9/10)

What brings this down to a 1/10 experience was the service. Overall, it seemed very disorganized. Our waitress was friendly when she came to take our order, but five minutes later a different waitress came to ask if we were ready to order. When we told her we already did, she looked confused and went to the machine for a couple minutes and seemed to be figuring it out with a coworker. Later when the taco and enchilada mains came out, the ceviché we had ordered was nowhere to be found. At this point, we didn’t bother to ask about it since we figured we had over ordered anyways and wouldn’t be able to finish (they can just take it off the bill). When the bill came out I was surprised to see the missing ceviché still on the bill. No problem. I called the waitress over and told her the ceviché never came out. What happened after was totally unacceptable. The waitress found her manager and gave her the bill. Instead of immediately apologizing and taking it off the bill, we sat in disbelief for over 5 minutes as the manager went downstairs and questioned the staff, and came back up to tell us the ceviche in fact had been made and served, essentially saying we lied. I told her we definitely never got the dish and we would be happy to talk to the runner who had brought us the food about it. Still not believing me, she then went downstairs to talk to her employees again before coming back and saying the staff were “unsure if they had served the ceviché to us” so she would take it off our bill. Even at that point, her attitude was accusatory and made us feel as though she thought we were trying to get out of paying for the meal.

Casa Enriqué if you’re reading this review, shame on you. No wonder your Michelin star was taken away. This is no way to treat your customers. If you look at the pictures we took of the food tonight, there is NO CEVICHÉ TO BE FOUND anywhere on the small table...

This place is clearly resting on its ancient laurels. It once had a Michelin star. But now, having just tried it for the first time, it’s inconceivable to me how this place ever delivered a Michelin star-worthy experience.

Ambience? What’s that? So loud you have to yell across a small table for your dining partner to hear you. Walls painted a grim white, chairs and tables a white plastic. No flowers, paintings, anything. Just white white thoughtless white.

Service was slow — I’m guessing they were understaffed for a Saturday night? We waited well over ten minutes after being sat till anyone came to our table. We were able to place our whole order at that time (having been left alone for that long with just our menus, including the massive jack of all trades cocktail menu). The servers were friendly and very helpful when they were at our table. They just didn’t come often, because again, pretty sure there weren’t enough.

We ordered guacamole, and chose the spicy heat level. What arrived was some of the blandest guacamole I’ve ever eaten, and there was absolutely zero heat to boot. Avocado tasted underripe in this (and in the avocado drizzles on our entrees as well).

Finally our drinks arrived. I ordered the Media Luna, my husband the horchata martini. My drink was really poorly mixed. I could taste all the ingredients seperately; rather than them harmonizing into an enjoyable cocktail, it just tasted like spirits (and this is a coconut cream-based drink!). At least the garnish was cute. My husband said his drink was flavorless and sort of like an adult milkshake.

Before we were done with our guacamole, the jicama and beet salad arrived. Fine, totally edible, but uninteresting to say the least.

I thought they were going to leave us with our dirty side plates taking up a lot of space on the table the whole meal, but thankfully they cleared them just before our main courses arrived.

My husband got the crab tostadas and said, again, totally flavorless. The texture of the tostada was all wrong, as the whole chip turned to crumbs with the first bite.

I ordered the vegan tacos, which were a mushroom (pretty sure oyster) in a sauce which tasted good, but not particularly interesting, nothing I would call great. Underneath the sauce, they had the flavor of mushrooms just starting to turn bad. It’s a flavor I’m particularly sensitive to, I’ll admit, but still.

No dessert ordered, we’re not masochists. $150 down, we won’t be back. Coming from neighboring Astoria, we would have had a better meal at literally any Mexican restaurant in our neighborhood, and for...

Lives up to its Michelin star rating - Really great food.. and great outdoor dining set up, even though it was a little cold that day.

Note: This restaurant does not take reservations so if you want to get a table I was told to get here around 5pm before it starts getting busy at 6-7pm.

We ended up arriving a little before 5 and this worked out perfectly, and were able to be seated immediately outdoors. We came here to celebrate my bf’s birthday and try out the food since it’s been Michelin star rated for the past 6 years - and we were NOT disappointed.

For drinks, we tried the strawberry mojito, regular mojito, casa Enrique margarita, coco-mojo, strawberry margarita, and caipirinha. All of the drinks were really tasty - so it’s a safe bet that you won’t be disappointed with whatever you pick.

For food, we started with the Albondigas en Chipotle (beef meatballs) - which were AMAZING. The sauce is delicious and it’s served with corn tortillas to eat them with. It’s a little steep ($18) but honestly worth it because they’re magical.

Next, we got the Pollo con mezquite (chicken tacos) - really tasty, but I think there are a lot of places in the city with great tasting tacos.

For the main course, we tried both of their chicken enchiladas - the De pollo en salsa verde and De pollo con mole de piaxtla. Both were really tasty, probably the best enchiladas we’ve had so far in NYC. The enchiladas with the mole sauce are very sweet! So if you’re looking for something more on the savory side, get the enchiladas with the green sauce.

For dessert, we got the Tres leches cake (and they added a candle upon my request). The cake was really moist and had wonderful flavors. I’ve found that sometimes the tres leches cakes can been a bit too wet, but this one had a pretty good balance.

While they do have indoor dining with dividers between tables, the outdoor dining set up is really nice for privacy and feels VERY safe for COVID, as you’re basically enclosed in a 3-wall room. Also the servers don’t have to come in next to you to take your order, and can stand outside the entrance to your area. They do have heaters fixed at the top of your room but it was still pretty chilly the day we went so the heaters didn’t help thattt much.

Overall, we had a wonderful time and we can’t wait to come back as the weather gets warmer! Thank you for a...