El Maguey Mexican Restaurant — Restaurant in Wentzville

Came to this restaurant on the 3/6/2021 looking to have some Corona-Ritas and small meals with some friends that evening. Upon arriving we noticed that the building is needing of a refurbishing and basic improvement. After sitting down my group ordered 3 Corona-Ritas, and some cheese dip to start. Upon getting our drinks, the taste was so strong of cheap tequila it was undrinkable. It was like drinking straight out the tequila bottle. None of us drank any of our drinks after tasting. The cheese dip that we received moments later was in the same cup as the salsa cups. If you know El Maguey, at other locations you get a bigger cup nearly 3x bigger in fact for cheese. With the waiters arrival back, we order food and I sent my Corona-Rita back for another one hoping that it would be better the next time. During this our waiter said "ok" left and brought back someone else to translate. They still didn't understand English, why the drink was being sent back. After difficult language barrier deliberation, a new drink was brought out. This drink managed to be worse than the first. After tasting your mouth was left with the purest taste of hand sanitizer. Asking my friends to taste to see if I'm acting crazy, 2 did and instantly agreed with the taste with the 3rd refusing. Upset with service and drink quality, I was ready to leave. When paying I asked for my drink to be removed. Neither of them were consumable. The waiter said he needed to get the owners approval walking to the back room. Moments later a fat Mexican man came out storming thru the dining room at me. Before I tell him anything, he begins to yell insults at me in Spanish and English making a scene. After speaking to the owner I realized, there is no customer service there. If you planned on going to this location DON'T! Just take the extra time to drive 5-10 minutes to two Lake St. Louis locations. The service is unmatched, quality drinks, and bigger cheese dip cups. I've never wanted to leave a bad review until having...

We went on a Thursday afternoon for an early dinner. It wasn’t too busy but by the time we left it was getting pretty busy.

We ordered lime margarita, 3 Mexican street taco combo meal (2 carnitas 1 carne asada), the enchilada/taco combo meal, and the taco/tostada combo meal

Pros: -their happy hour time is from 11-6 which gives you plenty of time to go in for cheaper drinks with a lunch time meal deal. -the flavor of the carnita and carne asada was good -the chips they give for chips/salsa were fresh and warm, perfect to munch on while you’re waiting for your food

Cons: In comparison to other El Maguey locations in STL I felt this location was lacking, specifically: -for corn tortillas with street tacos they just have them steamed in foil which isn’t the way street tacos should be, they should be cooked on the griddle with a little oil to bring out the flavor of the corn and give a little bite. Instead steaming them like this location does makes the tortillas blah tasting and easy to rip -the margarita is not as strong as the other locations -overall flavor of the salsas, beans/rice was lacking -price is higher than the other locations

I think I’d give them another try out of convenience but if you’re even in STL def give the other...

The atmosphere was fine, no problem. Service was a bit slow. But the food is my main criteria for judging a restaurant. I ordered Combo 3 consisting of a taco, a chile relleno and a beef enchilada. First off, every combo ought to have beans. This one did not. I had to steal a bite off of my friend's plate just to taste them. As it turned out that bite was the highlight of the meal. My crispy beef taco was only crispy on one side as it was served right in the middle of a sea of juice coming from the Chile relleno. The corn tortilla was like corn mush. The beef in the taco lacked any seasoning. It tasted like it was just boied in water. The chile relleno was stuffed with the same lifeless beef and a little cheese. The flavor was just ok. The enchilada was again filled with the sad, tasteless beef. The sauce seemed to be tomato based rather than chile based making it more like an Italian enchilada than a Mexican delicacy. The flavor was not horrible just not what I was hoping for in my quest for the best Mexican food...