Alebrije - Mexican Grill & Tequila Bar — Restaurant in Sanford

Last year we had a great lunch experience at this restaurant so we returned. The food quality and service remains consistent. - great.

FOOD: 5/5

Chicken Fajita: There's liberal amount of tender and moist pieces of chicken with the right ratios of bell peppers and onions in a sauce sizzling on a hot cast iron plate. The sauce is perfect and not salty. The chicken remains moist and tender even after the plate cools off. The pico de gallo, guacamole, sour cream, and black beans were the sides accompanying this dish. I opted for extra black beans as a substitute for rice. All the sides were great. The guacamole and pico de gallo tasted fresh. The black beans were cooked just right (not too soft and not too firm) and not salty.

Beef Fajita: similar to the chicken fajita, there's liberal amount of tender pieces of beef with the right ratios of bell peppers and onions in a sauce sizzling on a hot cast iron plate. The sauce is perfect and not salty. Pico de gallo, guacamole, sour cream, and black beans, and rice were the sides accompanying this dish. The rice was cooked and seasoned just right and very tasty.

Camarones a la diabla: 6 large prawns cooked in a hot pepper sauce served with rice. We opted for refried beans with this dish. The prawns were cooked just right (not chewy) and the sauce was smoky and very flavorful and had just a medium level of pepper heat. This dish was also great tasting.

Tortillas: all 3 dishes we ordered came with hot tortillas rolled up in paper and foil to keep them warm and moist. We had both corn and flour tortillas and they were great. Last year we watched a member of the restaurant making fresh tortillas at a corner of the restaurant. We didn't see the tortilla production this time but the tortilla's texture and taste is great this time too.

Chips and salsa: The chips were very good. The salsa was not spicy, but tasted fresh. The spicy salsa roja we ordered had a peppery and smoky flavor, tasted great with the chips

Coffee Flan: The coffee Flan texture was perfectly smooth and silky. The coffee flavor ratio was perfect and the sweetness was perfectly balanced, not overly sweet like flans of other places.

SERVICE: 5/5 Fast, friendly, and very helpful service from the waitress.

AMBIANCE: 5/5 This restaurant is located in a shopping plaza, but its interior layout is nice, clean, spacious and seating is very comfortable.

We're looking forward to returning next time we're...

My wife and I heard about this new place opening and decided yesterday to give it a try.

As others have said, we were warmly greeted and seated immediately for lunch. Our server, Ana, came quickly and brought us a carafe of water and two short glasses. Not sure if these were to discourage drinking water or not, but there was no ice and my wife asked me to get a glass of ice from the bar, so she used that to drink from. She also brought us a basket of chips and house salsa. I asked if she had something hotter and she said she would bring out all three of their salsas for me to try.

We each ordered two different margaritas to sample and pursued the menu, which was for brunch only, so limited in content. This was rather disappointing to me, but nonetheless I found many things to try. I ended up ordering the Chilliquiles and wifey ordered shrimp tacos.

Now the review: I’ll start with the chips and salsa. Not usually something that I would shed much light on, but wifey disliked them very much. Some were greasy, some weren’t. They were way too thick and lacked salt. Personally, they were ok for me and the thickness was perfect for cheese dip, though we did it try that. Out of the tre-salsas, I loved one (Molcajete) liked one (creamy verde) and disliked the other (Macho). Also, Ana failed to mention these were not complimentary and I was charged $10.00.

The margaritas were very odd with a smoky flavor in one and my wife could not stomach either, so I drank both. They came in tall glasses, mostly filled with ice and the liquid was not all the way to the top by an inch or more. For the $12.00 plus dollars, I’d stick to the free agua.

My wife’s three tacos came stuck to the parchment paper and were bathed in grease. She used her linen napkin to pat them down but not enough so she dumped the contents and ate it shelless.

My Chilliquiles on the other hand were delicious. I went with the verde sauce suggested by Ana, and it was the right choice.

All in all, it was rather disappointing, especially for my wife and for the $80.00 I’ll with tip. I’d go back for dinner and try the larger menu items, it doubt I can get the wife to return.

I apologize that I did not take...

Probably the best Mexican restaurant in Sanford, though it’s not without its quirks. I have been a multitude of times, and for the most part the food has been excellent! I would personally avoid any dish that comes with steak, as I've found it to be a little on the tough side, but I would recommend their birria tacos, their shrimp tacos, and their queso fundido without hesitation!

I also wanted to share this odd little story (though I'm not letting it influence my rating because I don't think anyone else will ever have to deal with this)-- when I dined here yesterday, I noticed that they had a bottle of yellow Chartreuse in their bar, and I inquired about it, asking if anyone ever orders it and if they would be willing to sell me the bottle (Chartreuse is getting hard to find, so I was hopeful I could get it for a good price from a place that clearly doesn't care about it). The bartender told me no one has ever ordered it before and that the bottle is there essentially "for decoration" (his words), and he said he would have to call his boss to find out if he could sell it to me. After waiting for 15-20 minutes, he returned and told me that he could let me buy the bottle for $300! Mind you, this is a $60 bottle at retail, so I was shocked that they thought they could attempt to rip me off by selling it to me for 5x retail, when it's something no one even orders there in the first place. I kinda thought they would want to give me decent price (I would have said yes to any price up to $100), to rid themselves of something that was just taking up space on their bar, so they could replace it with something that more people order, but that was not the case. I told the bartender that at that price "they must really like having the bottle as a decoration" and got up to leave. He then said that they would be willing to let it go for $250. After I finished laughing, I left and found two bottles of yellow Chartreuse at local liquor stores for $60 each, so I wound up with 2 bottles for $120, which sounds a lot better than 1 bottle for $250-300 lol. Enjoy your bottle, Alebrije Management, you clearly have no desire to ever...