Tacos El Patrón & Bar — Restaurant in Pleasant Hill

Update 9/13: My wife and I were invited back by the manager to come and experience this restaurant a 2nd time with better customer service for us. The manger, Alberto, did not lie. It was amazing. We were treated like customers should be treated. We both felt cared for and cared about. Hilario (waiter, bartender) overall amazing.. helped to make this experience wonderful. His conversation, jokes and just his attitude made us feel warm and welcome. Thank you Alberto and Hilario for ensuring that our 2nd visit was top notch. I 100% reccomend this restaurant. Oh btw... get the Birrias and Margaritas when you go. They are soooo freaking good!!!

Update 8/19/25: I was immediately reached out to by the manager (I didn't get the chance to post this sooner). He showed a concern around the issues that I listed. I appreciate the care he displays when it comes to issues at this establishment. He wants to engage that we have a better visit in the future. However, he asked me to reach out to him and unfortunately I do not know how to. If he or anyone fun his staff reads this, can you please send me a private message so I can discuss this further, as you requested. Thank you.

Visited this place with my wife because of the amount of reviews and the positive reviews or received. I'll give all the good first.

Pros: We were immediately seated. The chips and salsa tasted very fresh. The chips were served hot. We both ordered Super Birria Quesadilla with a side of rice and I ordered beans (Refried). She ordered a mango margarita and I ordered strawberry margarita. Our food came out hot Food and drinks were so tasty.

The restaurant is a beautiful space.

Cons: We sat 5-7 mins without anyone coming over. No one brought menus, water nor greeted us. The restaurant was not packed at all. They were mopping the restaurant during service time which is unsanitary and unhealthy due to fumes. That is something that should be done before or after hours. Not while customers are eating. Also, it is unsafe for customers to walk in wet floors (They had wet floor signs, but you still had to walk on the floor to get to your table. That is how you are sued for unnecessary slip and falls).

When we were finally greeted by Sebastian, our waiter, we were happy. However, about 2 mins later we were given another waiter, Ricardo. We didn't understand what happened to Sebastian. Ricardo did really well until accommodating us for a good amount of time. However, my wife asked for some items and he never brought her 2 items she requested, so she had to ask for them again. Right before we paid our bill, my wife ordered 2 strawberry lemonade. However, once we paid the bill. We sat and waited close to 10 mins for lemonade that had been sitting made over 7 mins ago. Ricardo never came back. My wife even reminded him when he picked up the card payment machine. I guess we became irrelevant after we paid our bill. That was not considerate of us as paying customers. Oh and yes.. he received a tip.

Another waiter was nice enough to get it for us when my wife told him that we had been waiting. He even gave us a drink tasty because we had been waiting so long. I forgot his name, not his face. Thank you so much for caring. Hope to see you next time when we visit again.

Lastly, the drink menu states that there is real fruit. However, we didn't see any fruit added nor really taste it like it had fruits. The strawberry lemonade was bland.

We will return again, but Ricardo cannot be out waiter...

This is the second time I have been here. The first time I only ordered Birria tacos. They were delicious and amazing. The consume was very well seasoned with not very much oil. However, I have now gone back for a second round and I ordered more items to truly provide my opinion. I ordered two tacos that supposedly came with a free side(never got it) and two quesabirrias. One taco was al pastor and one was suadero. The meats in the two tacos were not well seasoned. Matter fact they both just looked weird and the quality of meat was very sub par. The quesabirria was still good however there was a gigantic bone that I very well could have choked on in the middle of one of the quesabirrias (please refer to photo for bone size). Lastly, I also ordered a choriqueso that was interesting. I’ve never heard of something like that but it was good. The tortillas are “handmade” but they only give one tortilla per taco. If you know good street tacos, it’s at least two small corn tortillas per taco.

In addition to the food description above, I would like to touch on the service and overall take aways. I ordered online this time and my food took over 30 minutes to be ready. I only received one half full side bag of chips that tasted mildly stale. And they only provided one salsa of each kind they had for an order that included three different plates. That’s the equivalent to providing one or two slices of lime(which I only got 3 slices of lime). Lastly, the prices. One taco is $2.95. That’s too expensive for a half flavorful taco. They do pack the meat in but if the meat don’t taste good... it ain’t worth it.

All in all, will not...

Cleanliness: A Drinks: B+ Food: A Price: $$ Services: A+

The place was Really CLEAN, it’s a tad bit small for what I like to dine-in at, but this place was super clean and the ladies working kept the place clean while ppl finished their food!

It has a nice DRINK selection of Sodas, juices and beers. With a name like El Patron I wanted a shot of tequila, but overall great place to grab a beer and some tacos!

The FOOD was let’s say depending on what u like. I really enjoy Birria tacos, the dipping sauces was inconsistent from what I got to what my wife got, mine had more flavor it was more red you can see the yummy fatty oil which I enjoy in my batch vs My wife’s dipping sauce was more brown not as red by far and didn’t have the same flavor. The SHRIMP PATRON TACOS WITH CHEESE was 🔥🔥🔥 them thangs was GREAT!!!! The steak tacos was good not great like the shrimp tacos, and my daughter seemed to enjoy her bean and cheese burrito and my shrimp burrito was just as amazing as the shrimp taco after I got home.

PRICE I think their a tad bit over priced for what their asking in my opinion but what do I know I don’t run a restaurant and it must be okay cause many people was coming in and out of that thang!

SERVICE was awesome they really attend to you here. Keep a rotation of cleaning and greeting you making sure you need or don’t anything really really nice ppl the service alone would keep me coming to this place! Keep up the...