El Charro Café Oro Valley — Restaurant in Oro Valley

El Charro has been a favorite restaurant of ours for years. We have had a few hiccups, but overall we had great dning experiences, that is until we decided to recommend El Charro as a location to celebrate our friend's release from a medical quarantine following several months of cancer treatments. I called and made a reservation for 10 on September 27, 2024 at 5:30pm. I called to confirm the reservation a couple of days before our scheduled celebration and was assured we had the reservation. I reiterated to the person on the phone that this was a celebration for someone who had just gone through several months of cancer treatments. She stated they would take care of our party.

On the day of our reservation, I recieved a call from the Manager, Mary, who informed me that they had "sold out the interior restaurant" for another group and they couldn't accommodate our reservation. However, they could set up a table outside. The BIG ISSUE for our group was the temperature. It was 108° F outside and medical issues made outdoor seating a very bad recommendation. So, we declined their outdoor seating offer.

A while later, Mary called me back. She told me she had spoken with the General Manager and they would like to offer us free appetizers and desserts should we wish to reschedule our dinner. After telling our friends of their offer, we decided to give El Charro another chance for our dinner. A couple of days later, I called and made a reservation for October 25, 2024 for a party of 10 at 6pm with Mary, who stated they would help to make our dinner a pleasant experience.

I called the restaurant on October 24th and left a message for Mary confirming our reservation for the following evening, October 25th, at 6pm. Apparently, she didn't get the confirmation. I recieved a call on the morning of the 25th asking me to confirm the reservation, which I did...again.

On October 25th, we all arrived at the restaurant and were seated. I introduced myself to Mary and she said she hoped we would have a good dinner. Our server began taking drink orders as other members of the dinner party arrived. I mentioned to the server that we were offered free appetizers and desserts by Mary. He hesitated and stated he would go check it with the Manager. Mary came back over and stated they were only offering the option of 1 appetizer or dessert, period. This was not what was discussed over the phone when she called and offered the option, but we had no option but to agree. When our entree arrived, one of our dinner party did not recieve his order, as the server had given it to another member of our party. Instead of waiting to have his order filled, he decided to eat the meal given to him anyway.

When we recieved the final bill, we were charged for everything. No discount was given for 1 of the desserts nor was anything offered to our party member, whose entree order had been messed up. When this was brought to the server's attention he again went to the Manager to discuss this additional problem. I went up to the front desk and talked to our server. He stated he had thought the discount was for my appetizer or dessert (I hadn't ordered either dish), but they agreed to credit 1 of the desserts that had been ordered by another of our party members. By this time, the group was fed up with all of the problems that had occurred with our very poor choice of El Charro. It is my recommendation that people be very careful before deciding to use El Charro for large dinner celebrations. The food is good. The...

Ever since moving to Tucson we have heard of the famous El Charro Cafe and wanted to try it. Let's start with the good - the food was really yummy! Cabbage and turnips on tacos - yum! The quest fundido had really great flavor with the peppers and tomatoes. So delicious. But the rest of the experience was sub-par at best. Service was pretty horrible, in fact. We called when they opened to request reservations for 4:30pm for 4 adults and 3 kids under 2 years old. We were told they don't take same-day reservations but that they are always dead at that time and we'd be fine. We walked into the restaurant at 4:25 & were told that all of the high chairs were in use; could we try a booth and use boosters instead? Sure! So they sat us in a booth too small so I sat at the end with a chair while we waited on the boosters. 15 minutes later we still didn't have the boosters so I went back to the hostess to ask. She said yes and that she would bring them as soon as she sat the next people. 10 minutes later we still didn't have them and this time my Dad went to ask for them and she informed him that they were now out of boosters.

In the meantime, several drinks were ordered. The strawberry margaritas tasted like straight tequila with pink food coloring - there was no flavor at all besides the alcohol, let alone strawberry. The house margarita wasn't much better. We NEVER send things back but we couldn't drink the margaritas so we sent them back and nothing was said about it - not sorry, let us make you another, what else can I do, NOTHING. At one point I asked for extra napkins and was given a couple of the bar napkins that are the little tiny squares. Our waiter never checked on us. It was just a joke & a huge bummer considering that it was our fathers day celebration (on Saturday afternoon of...

I know El Charro is a Tucson gem, but now I’ve suffered poor service from both the downtown and Oro Valley locations. This review is for Oro Valley. We had a reservation for our party of nine. We arrived very early in the evening (meaning they weren't particularly busy) and they immediately started struggling with three simple drink orders. It took about ten minutes to get them directly from the bar. After we were seated and placed our orders, they brought out two wrong dinners, which is weird because the waitress used a handheld computer to take our orders. Then, they brought out a few of our meals, which sat there and got cold while we waited about ten minutes for the others to arrive. I received my meal, but had to wait about ten minutes to get my side orders. I asked for a side order of cheese. They finally brought me a salsa bowl with only a single tablespoon of shredded cheese in it…and they charged me an extra $1.50. I don’t mind paying for service and ambiance, but no one wants to get ripped off. They also charged me $4.00 for a cup of Pepsi, which they never refilled. We ordered appetizers, which were never delivered. Some received their side orders at the end of the meal, like they were dessert or something. Some never received their side orders. One of us ordered a glass of wine at the table, but received the wrong wine. They did bring an unknown woman out to our table to apologize. She never introduced herself, wore a blank, grey sweatshirt, and only said “sorry” before walking away. Despite the terrible service, they still tacked on their own 20% tip without telling anyone. I will close with a couple of positives that the waitress was, at least, not rude to us, and that they did honor their 10%...