Zama Mexican — Restaurant in Vinings

I would like to give Zama a 4.5 start rating, but since that is not an option I am giving it 5. That said, I am incredibly picky about my Mexican food (I live in Marietta and regularly drive 25 minutes to Woodstock to visit my favorite restaurant). Last night, I was determined to find some place closer, and I saw Zama was rated #2 on trip advisor, just behind Pappasito's (which in my opinion is not deserving of the #1 spot). We showed up shortly after 9pm on a Saturday and waited about 8 minutes for a table, which tells me that this place is busy and popular. The likelihood of experiencing a wait combined with a somewhat cramped layout and a LOT of noise are the main reasons I am dinging them half a star, but I do believe these things may be remedied by visiting on a week night, and are certainly a symptom of the restaurant's popularity. The decor was also pretty cool and might contribute more to the atmosphere at a less busy time. The food, however, was DELICIOUS. The chips were very thin and light, and the salsa was a unique and tasty blend. I had a 12oz. Cucumber Margarita ($8.99) that made me wish I'd ordered a 20oz. instead! My boyfriend had a 20oz. skinny margarita and we later split a 20oz. specialty marg made with Mezcal that had a complicated name (pictured), and they were both VERY good. I still liked my Cucumber Margarita the best. The 20oz. margs we ordered were in the $12-$14 range, which is pretty standard for a fish bowl. For our meals, I ordered the Steak Skillet and he ordered the Chiles Divorciados, which were a unique and interesting spin on chiles poblanos (both are pictured). We could not have been happier with the taste of our entrees, they were incredible! Despite the onset of our respective food comas (we both took home leftovers), we opted to order some sopapilla w ice cream for dessert, which is not on the menu, but they were happy to make for us anyway :) The food clenched the deal for us, and despite a rather large (for us) tab at the end (w tip we spent a little over $80 on a two person meal that included a 12oz. and two fish bowl margaritas), we will DEFINITELY be coming back to Zama for more tasty Mexican food!!! It was an overall...

Offering bottomless bowls of free chips and salsa is a fantastic way to get me to come to a restaurant repeatedly. Zama's gratis offerings are not only tasty - with corn chips on the thinner side and a super fresh pico de gallo - but servers will kindly ask if you want refills, a rare generosity these days.

I love that there's ample seating both indoors and outdoors, and service has been brisk and courteous regardless of seating choice. My go-to order is the Tilapia Milanesa, which comes with TWO lightly breaded fillets, black beans, Mexican Cole slaw, and rice. That, along with all the chips and salsa, make for a tremendous value for its listed menu price and I never walk away hungry.

Ordering a meal with adjustments (salad with "dressing on the side" or an extra cup of sauce) can be hard on the kitchen when they're busy, and we've had to give our servers a few reminders in the past, but they're always ready and willing to make things right. We also noted the misleading tip calculations at the bottom of our receipts, where the suggested amounts and percentages were notably higher than what the calculators said. My husband - the math whiz and the cynic - wasn't altogether pleased about it and considered saying something, but we both enjoyed our meals well enough that we decided against it. That being said, I figured it's worth mentioning in case anyone else might use those parts of the bill with any level of...

I hate I have to write a somewhat bad review because I actually love this place, but it won’t get fixed unless I say something. The food is always delicious but I’m starting to notice a pattern with the cooks in the kitchen. My husband is allergic to onions and we ALWAYS request no onions. There was one time we dined in and said no onions, he gets his food and it has onion in it so we send it back. Another time we ordered to-go and his food had onions after stating we didn’t want onions in his food. This go round, I order a chicken quesadilla to-go for my husband and again I say NO ONIONS, HE’S ALLERGIC. I even see that our server Jampier wrote it on the receipt with exclamations. My husband opens it to eat the food and checks for onions just to be sure and guess what we see, the whole quesadilla and side of rice is riddled with onions. What’s the point of me saying no onions and our server writing it for them to see if the cooks in the kitchen aren’t gonna follow directions. I love this place but the cooks in the kitchen need to do a better job at this. Had he eaten it without checking, we’d be in the ER. SMH 3rd times a charm, and idk if I can continue eating here if the cooks are dead set on not paying attention to customers...