Tacos Del Julio — Restaurant in Pasadena

Today on Sunday, April 6, 2025, me and my girlfriend went to tacos del Julio on Spencer Hwy for brunch. We got there at about 11:30. We sat down. Suddenly my girl said "There's a monkey in here!" I couldn't believe it because, how often do you hear that around here? I turned and looked and sure enough, THERE WAS A MONKEY INSIDE THE RESTAURANT!! I've heard of service dogs being allowed inside a restaurant, but this was monkey! The nasty and unsanitary part is, the owners of the monkey would touch the monkey and then touch stuff on their table, like the sugar, napkins, etc. The even more nasty part is that we saw this monkey walking on the floor and touching the floor and yet the restaurant staff and the owners still allowed the monkey to climb all over the table and touch the surfaces that people eat off of. They all allowed the monkey to climb on the window sill and sit there, with its feet touching whatever it touches. To make things worse, they took the monkey and showed it off to a crowd of people eating and allowed the monkey to climb onto the little wall that divides the dining room.

So how is this sanitary? It was cool to see that monkey, but how can this restaurant allow this nastiness to happen?? We saw after the money people left, the staff went over and wiped the table as they normally do. They didn't sanitize the little wall that the money was on, the window sill, the blinds, or the napkin holder or anything else the money touched. This is the last time I will be eating anything from here. Absolutely disgusting!!

August 1, 2025 edit.

So looks like the restaurant owner lied to me about addressing the issue, they lied about calling the cops. I knew that, cops in Pasadena always show up!!! Then the owner of the monkey saw this review and called out the owner for lying as well. He also called me a liar, which idk why, I never lied. Tacos del Julio had welcomed a monkey in the place. It was shedding hair, crawling on the floor and wall, and then crawled all over tables and chairs. Tacos del Julio allows wild animals to roam freely.

Just read other reviews here and you'll find how some people only come here for "Gigi" the monkey.

The monkey has been coming here for a long time. Why did the restaurant owners...

Our first and last visit. It took quite a while to get service and we had two different people it seemed who were waiting on us. We got our drinks and then someone brought us boiled beans. A few minutes later he brought out some limes, some onions, and some cilantro. I asked if we were going to get chips and they said no, we get beans instead. When they finally came to take our order, I asked what was good since it was our first visit. We were told the steak fajita meat so we both ordered the pick 2 dinner thing. I can't remember the names of the steak soft tacos but we both ordered different ones. It was horrible! I did not eat anything off of my plate except one bite of whatever that steak soft taco thing was. When I ask for it to be taken off of my bill after about 20 minutes of waiting for someone to come by ( I actually have to walk up to where they were and ask for help) the guy told me we do not take things off of bills. I told him that I didn't eat anything on my plate and that it was terrible and I asked him to get a manager or someone because it was terrible. The meat was bright red...like unbelievably bright red!! I have never seen meat that looked like that before in my 41 years of life! This is a place we will...

Hands down some of the best tasting meats in the Pasadena area, still savoring the delicious Trompo . We ordered the Friday special which included two beef tostatadas , a very nice portion of menudo & a drink;all for 10$ ! We also ordered the" Monterrey 400 " which came with a very generous portion of both beef carna asada and Trompo ,grilled onions , asadero quesadilla cheese topped with avocado and HOMEMADE corn tortillas . Additionally we ordered a side order of rice and a chips with queso which was delicious as well/ CHARROS ARE FREE .(TOTAL COST 40 $ FEEDS 4 ) All and all I rate Tacos de Julio a 9.5. The .5 deduction is because I have to agree with some of the bad ratings listed. Our waitress was great but seemed overwhelmed. I watched my food sit there for about 2-4 minutes until finally a man who looked like he may be a manager came and told one of the girls to bring it to my table. Note:I seen three girls standing in the front many times just talking while our waitress was busy trying to keep up .The team was present but no TEAM WORK. DELICIOUS FOOD...