El Carbonero — Restaurant in Santa Ana

Went today August 4th 2017 with a friend of mine. From the minute we walked in we got dirty looks from the waitress she was not nice at all. Asked her about items on the menu and she did not know. In total we ordered 5 pupusas and 2 drinks and it took more than 40 mins to receive everything, and the place was nowhere near full. When we recieved our orders the pupusas were burnt each from one side and all of the pupusas were stiff. We had a 3 and 9 year old who couldn't even eat the pupusas off how hard they were, I'm not realy the kind to complain on my orders or in general about the food, but it was just rediculous!!! I told the waitress why were they so hard and she "maybe the cook left it on the iron for too long" well can't we get another or a refund the pupusas were literally burnt each from one side. Both waitress were he'll of ride !! Some fat lady with a mushroom cut and some other lady with curt hair! BAD SERVICE! DO NOT RECOMEND ! I am NEVER going back to...

This is a Salvadorean restaurant, the staff is good, very quick to take your order, very polite and friendly waiters. The food menu at this place is very diverse, you can order from tacos, soups, sea food and of course the famous Pupusas, which are not so bad, I mean I've tasted better ones in LA. What's really delicious are the traditional Tamales, I'd dare to say, their Tamales are the absolutely best! The flavor is so rich, I've tried the tamales from the San Sivar restaurant in Costa Mesa, those are not even close to the taste of the ones in El Carbonero... the prices here are very reasonable and affordable, with $5 you can eat a tamale or a taco or 2 pususas, (well if they didn't charge taxes) this place is Cash only thou. Oh one more thing, for people who knows Salvadorean beers, they have all the national beers, pilsener ++. The place looks not so clean some times but all the food is...

The service is bad. It's slow and the servers aren't friendly. Only one was nice after our complaints. We waited almost an hour for our food. We asked a waiter twice when our food was going to come out, but they look at us for only half a second and spoke as they walked away. I don't know what is up with this place. We asked for the check since we wanted to eat somewhere else. But when my father went to the cashier to pay (for our drinks only), the lady told him that our food would be coming out shortly. It felt like they forced us to stay. We wanted to leave. I got the popusa de loroco. It was delicious! My mother didnt like the popusa de chorizo whatsoever. We won't come back ever. I certainly won't recommend this place to others. There are other places in OC that serve delicious...