Circo — Restaurant in Sarasota

Came here for the first time on taco Tuesday as recommended from my date, the place looked lively and awesome! We were at the front and a busy waitress kindly welcomed us as she hustled and were not sure whether to find a seat or wait to be seated. We found a dirty table (taboo I know but we were willing to be patient due to our excitement) and luckily another nice waitress cleaned it up for us quickly!

It wasn’t until this male server came to our table with an upset demeanor on his face and an annoyed tone in expression and voice. He asked what we wanted to drink when we didn’t even have a moment to look at the menu. Took a quick look and ordered a random margarita, my date ordered and we both showed our ids.

The server stated he doesn’t feel comfortable serving her drinks due to her behavior. Immediately we were surprised and she became embarrassed as we both know she only had a glass of wine at 99 bottles while working on the phone with clients and networking with others around her. She was busy and barely had time to enjoy a drink.

I try to save the moment by saying it’s okay that we really just came here for food instead of drinks. To celebrate taco Tuesday. To reassure her it’s okay as I can see her confusion. After the server left she started to cry and stormed out the building.

She has a bubbly personality and she also has high functioning BPD. She was just really excited introducing me to this establishment and she didn’t mean to weird out the server.

I apologize the “temporary” inconvenience of this rating. I want to give this place another try as I know this server was slammed and it was perhaps a bad timing of conflicting moods of her cheerfulness and his dread.

I will be back and hope my date will understand to come back with me.

Further note to the server who attended to us. I’d advise to be mindful of your expression and the way you say something to someone in the line of service, especially cutting someone off. You didn’t apologize to cutting her off and we would be totally okay being cutoff but you came off cold and unnerving as you stated your words to her. This I did not appreciate. For the sake of your coworkers and the vibrant establishment you represent. That type of tone you carried is nice if you’re a bouncer, but you’re not that big. Some individuals of service are just not meant for FOH and excel in duty at BOH work.

I did not take kindly for the added comment of her needing water instead of you apologizing as I try to be kind enough to warn you that we are leaving as not to waste your effort, but I should have just left without a word to you.

Her storming out also almost made her lose behind her phone and my personal cherished gift I brought along for her.

Luckily El Melvins was not far and their high quality environment justified the price. Rocco’s at UTC is also nice for being open late and good specialty margaritas.

Respect and cheers to the kind hustling female waitresses of Circo carrying the team as they were also slammed. Will be back for them for their 5 stars...

Highly NOT RECOMMENDED. Total FLOP of Mexican food Our female server Sunday was not good. Sweet as she was, terrible service. And we were only one of 2 tables there so really no excuse for it. We both ordered a water and drink. She brought drinks no waters. We drank our drinks, she came to get our order, didn’t seem to notice both empty glasses which stayed empty till our food was brought out by someone from back. One other table and we gotta beg for refills so i reasked her for our waters, no apology. All 4 glasses stayed empty till we left. The tacos were just bad. Tortillas desert dry & stale, difficult to chew. Only one even decent was braised beef but even that was dry as a bone, zero juice. The Mongolian one was soooo dry and that would have been bad enough but we couldn’t get our refills so hard to even chew or swallow. The 2 stars is for the fried cookie dessert. 60$ spent begging for water and drink refills, 4 small stale tasteless zero flavor dust-dry tacos we could barely chew and the fried cookie dessert. We won’t be back for sure. Not sure how the reviews were so good. Baffled by that which is why we chose it. Big mistake, waste of hard earned money. Gnawing on my shoe would have exceeded the flavorless tacos and been easier to chew. Location is on point but the experience was worse I’ve had in over a year at any restaurant for bad service with no good excuse for it being one of 2 tables and the grub except for cookies sucked. Even the verde salsa and chips were just terrible. We barely ate any of the watery garlic-less flavored salsa mostly dry chips which seemed freshly fried were good. She took our barely touched salsa away with tons of chips left without asking if we were done. Because of now bland the salsa was and the fact we didn’t like it we didn’t say anything but who does that? Practically a full bowl of salsa and tons of chips whisked away. How does a Mexican restaurant with these great reviews mess up SALSA AND 🌮 TACOS BOTH? shouldn’t that be the 2 things they master? Food wasn’t even worth a photo. Don’t waste your time or money here. So disappointed. Taco Bell would have been better. All in all worst Mexican food I’ve had in years. And subpar service the entire time. Also the menu is VERY LIMITED selections. How’s this place still open? Who’s writing these...

We heard about this place, so we finally decided to visit one evening for an early dinner. We parked in the Whole Foods garage as there’s little parking on street.

When we arrived, there were no tables available, and we decided to sit at the bar. But the barstools were uncomfortable so we retreated to one of the old couches to wait for a table to become available. Overall the decor is street taco festive and we could easily have a conversation. There’s several areas with large couches and chairs. The restaurant floor is concrete. Looks it seats about 50 people overall. This is a casual taco bar where you’d come to eat not dine.

The bar is situated at one end of the restaurant and has about 10 low back stools. I found the stools very uncomfortable, but that could just be me.

The menu has an interesting mix of tacos all for about five dollars each. There was a good selection of bourbon and tequila drinks on the menu. There was also good selection of bourbon and whiskeys that you could buy neat.

We opted for the smoked old-fashioned and the bourbon margarita. The Old fashioned came out with no smoke. In questioning the waitress she said removed the top at the bar and all the smoke disappeared before it got to the table. At $14 I would have expected it to be delivered to the table under smoke. The bourbon margarita comes with salt on the rim, which I think takes away from the taste. Overall I thought the cocktails were overpriced for what you got.

We started our dinner with a queso dip and chips. The queso had birria added which gave it a nice flavor.

For tacos we ordered the Thai shrimp, Mongolian beef, and Cubano. All had a good flavor. We expected the protein to be a bit warmer but they must make it in advance and assemble as ordered. Some of the other tacos on the menu also looked very interesting and they would’ve been equally as good. They do have a taco tray with two tacos and some chips which looked like a good deal.

Service was attentive but not over bearing.

We’d come back for the tacos but...