On The Border Mexican Grill & Cantina — Restaurant in Town of Brookhaven

I have been going to 5 Burro Cafe since I was a young girl living in Kew Gardens. My mother was obsessed with their chicken soup-which was beautifully simple and tasted like home cooking from a Latin American/South American household. You would leave the place satiated but not engorged, slightly tipsy, and full of smoke.

Fast forward to current-day older me. I brought my friend there, boasting about their margaritas and relaxed atmosphere.

Got there right before their food service ended and just asked for chips and whatever salsa they may still have cause we aren't inconsiderate people and we know the kitchen staff probably wanted to just go home. Of course the bartender said 'No' and we were okay with that. Ten minutes later, I saw him bring food out to a group of men sitting by the bar. Snack food that certainly could not have taken more than 2 minutes to prepare-looked suspiciously like chips. But again, I thought nothing of it. It was pretty late.

We ordered our drinks, which taste like moderately better margaritas than what you could get from some average, overly corn-syruped slushie machine. Again, I was disappointed but it was still better than other slushie machine margaritas so nothing worth crying over. I still found a way to enjoy it. There's of course the possibility that my friend and I both ordered the wrong flavors.

BUT, what upsets me to the point where I cannot begin to convey is how the owner/manager/middle-aged white and/or Latino-looking man posted up by the bar acting like a manager acted towards my friend when she approached him about a man who was menacing women at the bar's jukebox.

I cannot tolerate a managerial figure who sits idly by as a someone expresses concern about patron's safety.

There was a large, tall, middle-aged white man with long hair and a bandana tied to his head walking around menacing females who tried to change the music playing from the jukebox. He visibly got upset and slightly irate when a group of Hispanic Latino people were playing reggaeton, pop latino, and some bachata. As soon as their last song finished he ran over to the jukebox and put enough money in there to play his preferred music-totally fine. Never mind you are one person in a bar full of people who were enjoying the other music but still it's okay to be selfish when you're tipsy and want to hear your jams. I understand the feeling.

However, when several different groups of females went to the jukebox to try to request a song, he would go over to them, raise his voice so he could be heard and inform them to not bother 'wasting their money, cause his music is going to play until the bar closes'. They would recoil and hurriedly walk away because who wouldn't? And he did this only to the females who went to jukebox, not the males. So, not to be deterred by bullying, I went to request a song. And this man thought it would be acceptable to approach me and smugly deliver the same line about his music playing until the end of the night. I replied that what he was doing was called menacing and I wanted him to remove himself from my presence immediately as kindly as I could because truthfully, I realized he was too drunk and could possibly hurt someone. He scoffed and told me 'no matter how much money you put in there, it won't change the music.' As though I never told him...

Take a seat and put your feet up while i tell you my horror story at On The Boarder. Arrived 2 hours before closing and figured this would be more than enough time for me and my girlfriend to grab something on a Friday night. Walked into an almost empty restaurant (sign #1) and we were seated.

Our waitress was nice enough. First came the sampler plate which had Dollar Tree tier chimichanga tips, stale nachos and a pretty decent quesadilla.

We figured "We already put in our entrees, might as well stick it out". Bad move. Food came out and the disappointment was thick in the air. I ordered a combo (pick 3 items type of deal) and my girlfriend ordered a chicken and shrimp dish. We looked at each other and knew that we had made a terrible mistake.

The Food My enchilada was tough, luke warm and unpleasant all around. My empanadas were okay enough to really be edible. My fish taco, which I paid a dollar extra for, was made with Gordon Fisherman's finest rejected batter sample. Flavorless and probaby freezer burnt.

My girlfriend's dish was better than mine but, at this point, a cardboard box covered in cheese would have gotten Gordon Ramsay's approval over my abomination...

She also ordered a side of black beans that tasted like they were from a can. AND they decided to cover them with some weird chunky cottage cheese mix that we picked off.

Then, while eating, someone walked in. I assume he was an employee from another shift. He began yelling and swearing across the floor until he realized that there were customers seated in the dining area. He quieted down for a moment, but eventually he and the 2 servers started to do the same.

So, overall the food was terrible and the staff were loud and swearing. The last thing to top this off was the hours of grinding sounds coming from my stomach that night as it tried to digest what I ate. I'm afraid to wonder what the...

On The Border Mexican Grill in Holtsville was a random stop in, yet pleasant surprise. A friend of mine who swears by Chili’s recommended we go to his spot, though when we arrived we noticed another restaurant that shared the same Parking Lot. Deciding to investigate the menu we were lured inside, immediately seated and promptly served warm chips and salsa. Glancing through the menu we were asked about drinks, and given that this is a Mexican grill we opted for the margarita pitcher for $12.00 Our waiter was quick, friendly and responsive, without being looming and over attentive (we went between lunch and dinner rush) The food we ordered was great, we had two more pitchers (there were three of us, and it had been a long day lol!) and for three people, three pitchers of margaritas, a sampler app, all you can eat tacos (9.99*) and table made guacamole (They come to the table and literally make it in front of you, for the up charge it is worth it. It’s more fresh.) we got out of there for under $100.00 and as if the experience wasn’t good enough at this point (it was) the manager came to our table and inquired about our meal, the quality of not only the food but the service, he chatted for a short while, in a way that suggested he cared genuinely about his customers, thanked us for coming and gave us his card. After this experience my friend who swears by Chili’s proclaimed he’d never visit there again while On The Border was an option, and I think those words speak...