Epazote Kitchen & Cocktails — Restaurant in Oro Valley

Epazote Review Excellent restaurant with pleasant ambience. Exceeded our expections. We are staying in the Hilton 4 star hotel in Oro Valley Arizona for our 50th wedding anniversary. We decided to try the hotel's Epazote Kitchen and cocktails despite seeing some sketchy recent reviews. Our experience was excellent and exceeded our expectations. Our server, Jasmine, was kind, patient, and attentive. The bartender, Sam, did an great job on our cocktails. Then, Jasmine and Sam worked together to get us tastings of three wines to help us decide on a bottle of wine. When I asked Sam about after dinner drink she offered a tasting of a her own special drambuie creation. It was spicy, delicious, and had a very nice bouquet. They provided Jalapeno corn muffins with herb infused butter to start. We then ordered two starter courses share: First the Elote en vaso and then the Epazote salad. These were served as courses with no rush as we requested. Both dishes were taste winners. My entree was the prescott raised strip steak, with goat cheese fondue sauce. This was thick cut and deliciously enhanced by the sauce, which offset my only criticism, that it was rare, but not blue-rare as requested. My spouse enjoyed the generously large Ahi tuna poke bowl, she described as spicy, but not too hot with many good textures from the greens and rice. As we were finishing, I mentioned this was a great experience for our 50th wedding anniversary. Well, they immediately insisted on providing a complmentary dessert, which they decorated with an happy...

We ate here Friday and Saturday night as we were staying at the hotel and just wanted to relax without driving around to other places. On Friday night they were empty and the food and service was great. On Saturday night the restraunt was about half full and this was a terrible experience. The weather was perfect so we sat outside. 2 couples and 2 toddlers. We were served water and our drinks right away. From that point we sat there for 2 hours and could only get 2 drinks and apps. At one point we had empty plates and empty drinks for 30 min. We mentioned this to the server and she said she was waiting on bartender and chef. Walked into bar and only 7 people were sitting and they all had drinks. The bartender was just talking. As for the chef they should be able to male multiple plates at once. Not one at a time. However, when the food did come out it was very good so that was nice. We did talk to the manager and he was extremely nice as well. He could be a little more constructive with his staff or he needs to speak to someone else higher up as it seems this has been happening lately according to other reviews and staff. They did offer to comp us but we refused as we are not looking for free food and drink. We would rather have them correct the issues they were having. This was our first time staying here and we would like to stay here again when we come back. Our busser was amazing. That guy kept our water glasses full the entire time and we drank a...

While staying at the El Conquistador I ate here twice. The first night I was seated at the bar and had their pear and hibiscus salad with grilled chicken and it was delicious. The second night I was joined by a friend for dinner I had their short rib tacos and the meat was incredibly salty. He had the pork chops which were amazing and cooked perfectly. As a note, if you want to sit on the patio, make sure you have a reservation. They will not seat you outside without one. We got there right as it was opening, but because we didn’t have a reservation, they wouldn’t seat us on the patio. However, there were tons of open tables on the patio the entire time we were there eating and even after we left, so not sure why it was such a big deal if they didn’t have actual reservations booked for that time to put somebody there. Other than the host being weird about the patio, the waiter and the bartender on both nights were very nice and helpful. It’s a little on the pricey side, but not a surprise for a resort I would definitely go back for the salad, but not so much for the short rib tacos. We also had the maple torte which was incredibly sweet, and the cake was a little too dense. Not my favorite but if you really like maple it would be a...