El Patron Cocina Mexicana — Restaurant in Tulsa

Update 3/16/24 The shrimp on the Pollo Norteño was fabulous. Large plump fresh tasting shrimp, perfectly cooked to deliver a nice snap when biting into them. Lightly seasoned and covered in hot melted cheese. All this, over a large thin grilled chicken breast floating on a bed of peppers, onions and tomatoes sauteed in butter. An outstanding plate of flavor. Not a light meal. This meal is absolutely recommended! My wife had the El Patron Bowl. A big healthy bowl of black beans, lettuce, and Pico de Gallo topped with grilled seasoned chicken. Both meals were very good. I would like to have given El Patron 5 stars on this visit. The service is still lacking. It was adequate. We got our meals and the waitress disappeared until time for the check. An offer to refill our drinks was all I was hoping for. El Patron is a nice large comfortable restaurant with an upscale ambiance, creating an expectation that the quality of the service will match the quality of the food.

Previous review * An upscale décor, absent of blazing bright colors and paintings of cactus, sombreros and burros. The restaurant is roomy with a modern design and decorations. The interior and the attire of the wait staff present the image of an upscale restaurant. Nicely Done! That may be what caused my disappointment. I was expecting the food to deliver in the same way. I have no significant criticism of the food or service,….. It was just average. They have a very large menu with a good selection of seafood and a reasonably priced lunch menu. I had the Carne Asada with a chili toreado and my wife had the Enchiladas Blancas. The Carne Asada was tender marinated thin sliced flank steak with a hint of char flavor. The enchiladas were three, cheese and spinach filled enchiladas covered in queso and topped with grilled shrimp. The refried beans were good, but the rice could have been better. Judging from the size of the bar, it is the restaurant’s focus. “Drinks” and Mexican food. I would have no problem recommending El Patron to a friend; however, I would qualify my recommendation a “good average Mexican restaurant with a big bar”. If you are looking for other Mexican restaurants in the area, check out my reviews in my collection "Jalapeno Highway" on Yelp. I've...

Some of the worst service I have ever seen at a restaurant. It frankly ruined this place for a team of us.

Went in with a half dozen coworkers for a lunch meeting. We were seated pretty quickly. Place looks nice, food was not bad, service was an embarrasement. Our server struggled to understand what we were saying and couldnt seem to get our drinks correct. He kept adding the word "diet" to everything. It was like a bad SNL skit.

One of our team is very allergic to onions. He ordered a meal and asked them to leave off onions. Food took a while, which was fine. The guy that can't eat onions got his first. It was loaded with onions. He tried to explain to our server but he couldn't understand and had to get the manager. It was explained to the manager he couldn't eat onions and she said, "sir, let me explain something to you" and commenced to explain how Mexican food is cooked with onions and to expect it. She then asked if he could pick the chicken out and eat that.

He asked for the food to be removed from the bill and decided to just eat chips and salsa given the limited remaining time. The manager asked if she could bring something else out. He explained we needed to get back to the office and it was okay.l because it would take too long to cook She ran into the kitchen and came back with food anyway, something he had no clue what it was and didnt order. And to top it off the rice on that dish was loaded with onions. So he pushed it back and pointed out the onions. She asked him to eat around it and he declined. That frustrated her even more and she huffed off to the kitchen with the new plate of food.

We sat talking for a minute and the server started taking plates, without asking. Some we were still eating. We had to ask him to stop. He finally disappeared while we finished.

Food was okay but I have never seen a restaurant where the manager argues with patrons and explains to a mid 50s man that Mexican food is cooked with onions as if justifying the mistake instead of correcting it.

This was our 4th and final trip in. ...

Extremely disappointing. Ate here a week ago and it was good, affordable and had a variety of options, so despite rainbow sprinkles (sent back for sprinkle free) on espresso flavored flan and meh service I came back and brought the crew. This visit was bad. Service: Had to flag down walking past servers on 3 different occasions: Drinks all four dry several times/chips basket empty after waiting on food 30 minutes/ refill salsa/need napkins. Had to flag down our server at least twice for each request. Last request was asking after side of raw onions that was ordered with the meal 3 times before he brought out grilled onions. When I approached the hostess desk to ask for help we were told thanks for being a good experience for a new server. My problem with the ‘new server’ was he had another table of four besides ours and a table of 8. Food took over a half hour after ordering to make it to table at 3/4 in afternoon on Saturday. They delivered each plate 5 minutes separately- by different people; including the ‘veg’ plate with pico, sour cream, guacamole. Menu: Has a good variety of options including steak and seafood. Fair warning I was told when I attempted to order steak that all steaks are medium well to well done only at cooks preference. I quickly chose something else along with two other people at the table. Food: Enchiladas plate was rated at bland, and wasn’t finished by choice. Street tacos looked the best, but was apparently spicy with hidden peppers in the meat, so was eaten by another person then who ordered the Pick two burrito and chili relleno. It was apparently disappointing but it was finished although was told this person wouldn’t go back. I had a chimichanga, and the fajita chicken was over cooked until dry and chewy but had good flavor. Cilantro rice was bland and tasted like reheated leftovers. Cost was roughly $20 a person without alcohol/specialty drinks; appetizers; extras; or desserts. 2 people drank water. Pictures were from...