Mama Inez — Restaurant in Pocatello

We were taking a party of 6 out to celebrate a birthday. The birthday boy chose this restaurant. We waited over an hour and 45 minutes for our food. There was one other bigger party and a couple. The waitress kept saying they only had one cook so that’s why it was taking so long. Finally we had to request the food to go because we were late to the baseball game we were also going to. We get to the game (late so bad seats) and we get the food open and not only were the utensils missing but the birthday boy’s entire meal was missing! Are you kidding me? Also, we were missing three orders of rice and beans. I called the restaurant and told the girl that answered our frustrations. She told me to hold on a minute and then another person came on the phone! I again explained the issues to the next girl and she asked a few questions then told me to hold. Now, I’m not joking when I say a third girl got on the phone and just said “hello.” I explained for a third time why I was irate at that point. She just kept saying it’s not their fault they are short staffed and there was nothing she could do. They literally expected not to give us the food we paid for. My hubby talked to them and told them to get the food going and he will come pick it up. He went back to the restaurant (missing the game with his family). When he got there, not joking again, they only gave him two orders of rice and beans. He had to wait even longer for them get the right food out. Now, going on two and a half hours after we first walked in the door, we sat and ate our soggy, cold food at the ballpark. There’s more, my hubby cut open his beef Changa to find chicken inside, and I cut into my cream cheese chicken burrito to find dry chicken and no cream cheese! Horrible service whether there was only one...

Stopped in recently with a friend from Vegas who went to ISU and remembered having excellent Mexican food at Mama Inez. I love carne asada and almost always order it at whichever Mexican restaurant I go to. My friend ordered a cheesy chicken burrito with red sauce and I ordered carne asada. When our order arrived we both thought we had gotten someone else's order, his had a dark yellow sauce and my carne asada looked like finger steaks with peppers and mushrooms. I'd never seen carne asada that wasn't made with skirt steak or flank steak. This looked NOTHING like carne asada. While waiting for our waitress to come back so we could tell her that we had someone else's order I jabbed a piece of mushroom and ate it. Big mistake! The small slice of mushroom set my mouth on fire! It was literally covered with pepper making it inedible for me. It was so spicy that now I was sure that it was a spicy finger steak dinner that someone else had ordered. Unfortunately when the waitress eventually stopped she told us that my order was carne asada and the dark yellow sauce on my friend's order was red sauce. When I attempted to eat my "carne asada " the finger steaks tasted nothing like carne asada and the meat was so tough and full of gristle that I could only chew about 60 percent of this flavorless meat! I took the peppers and mushrooms home so I could rinse enough black pepper off to make th edible. WORST Mexican food I've ever had! Will never go back to...

Mama Inez has been a family favorite for around 20 years (and admittedly, their decor and menu are 99% unchanged in that time). In my eyes, there are a few calibers of Mexican restaurant: 1) the authentic style where you can get meats like head, tongue, tripe, etc. 2) high end, from-scratch, psuedo Americanized Mexican and 3) tex-mex, average quality, good flavor.

Mama Inez falls under #3. The food is great, but their beans and rice are average to mediocre. Their entrees are well done, though. A favorite of mine is the beef, cheese and onion enchilada (with shredded beef, of course). Another family favorite include their cream cheese and crab enchiladas.

Where they really shine is their salsa that comes out before the meal. Most restaurants have a flavorless, bland "salsa" sauce, where Mama Inez makes their salsa fresh. If for no other reason, you need to at least try their salsa. If it's your first visit, an order of cheese crisps is a must as well; they're sort of a baked flour tortilla crisp topped with enchilada sauce and melted cheese. Between the salsa and the cheese crisp, you'll wonder why you bothered to order an entree.

Overall, recognize the place for what it is (not authentic Mexican, and not some chef-prepared, from-scratch Americanized Mexican). Just a good meal for a pretty...