El Burrito Mercado — Restaurant in Saint Paul

The first time I went was a year ago. I wasn’t familiar with how it worked but was eventually sat down by a kind waitress after asking her for help, and she took my order. It ran smoothly like a typical restaurant and I had a great experience.

I went back yesterday for the second time to share the experience I had, with my friend. Upon entering we waited a moment to be seated/ looking for someone available for help. We were patient and a little confused but decided to wait until someone looked available to help. However during this time, there was a lady (not sure if she worked for the restaurant/market or not) leading a game in the rooms, making eye contact with us and does not ask if we needed help or acknowledge us. I should also note that it was not busy. My friend and I walked a bit to look for someone to help and there was no one free around. Eventually the lady leading the game helped us after we stood around for a few minutes. We appreciated the help and ordered our food. We didn’t know we had to pick up the food ourselves at the window (as most restaurants that has you scan for the menu usually brings it out to your table) until it notified us. Not a big deal but would’ve been nice to know what to expect.

We weren’t upset at all up until a few moments later while we were waiting for our food, a family was seated next to us and a waiter took their order. We didn’t make it a big deal but were confused how they were waited on but we had to wait around. I don’t want to bring race up but the family was white and we were POC. So we felt a little discriminated.

Overall we were disappointed with the service. The food I got was good. The atmosphere was really nice. I’m sure the service is usually good since many people hype this place up, and we just so happened to be the ones that didn’t have a super...

Full disclosure: I love El Burrito Mercado---from the hot and cold offerings available for take-out, the groceries, to the art imports---but yesterday I was a bit disappointed by the cashier in the hot food line. My friend and I went in for the "Twin Cities Live Super Bargain" for the Taco Platter offered at 50% off if you specifically asked for the deal. We asked for the deal when ordering and went to check out. The cashier rang my order at full price, so I said, "Oh, I'd like to receive the Twin Cities Live Super Bargain price." to which she replied, "Okay, what is the code word?" I told her that I was confused, as I thought that asking for the TC Super Bargain was the correct way to get the discount. She replied, "No, you must know the special words to say or it is full price." I told her that I did not know any other "special words to say" and if that were the case I wish that the servers had alerted us that when we placed the order that our phrasing for the deal was incorrect and I'd have just ordered something else. She shrugged, said, "Sorry." and offered to take off approximately $2 from each of our orders. In lieu of being rude and just walking away from the trays of already custom-ordered prepared food, we agreed and thanked her. We went down into the bar area, where we subsequently ordered drinks and dessert from the lovely employees working the bar and tables there, and enjoyed our meal. I will go back because again, I love the venue, but a little less rigidness on the part of that one employee would have been greatly...

Update= u pay over $25 for premaid food and a drink...and u have to tip, so you walk away with a $30 bill for 1 person for food that wasn't cooked just for you, that has been sitting on the heat tray for a while, maybe adjust your prices between what's cooked a la carte and whats off heated trays, this pretty much isn't better than Chipotle as you don't even offer fresh veggies to add, yet it's much more expensive.... end of update....

If you are someone who wants to eat more than 5 bites you may want to keep an eye on the people serving it, it doesn't seem like they train them, sometimes I get a lot and sometimes it's pretty empty, it seems like they are too used to people getting 2 different meats and when they do 1 only they don't know how full it should be, I don't necessarily mind it cause I'm in the weight watching train so I take it as a favor. Haha, but in the back of my mind it still feels like a RIP off and I know some people freak out about things like this, so I'm doing both the store and customers a favor I think, you store pay attention to employees and customers ,if you are the type that want exactly fair or even a little more ,don't leave it up to luck cause as I said it's not constant or even on purpose it's just plain...