El Toro Mexican Grill & Cantina — Restaurant in Wilmington

Never again.

Edit to add: I've eaten here 3 times. The food is mediocre, but I can love a Mexican restaurant with mediocre food if it's fast, reasonably priced, and has decent service. El Toro does none of those things.

The first time was on Taco Tuesday. I found out when the bill came that one of my tacos was not at the Tuesday price but was instead at a full a la carte price. I wasn't given any indication of this beforehand (ate at the bar and wasn't given a menu, just told the tacos were $2).

That left a bad taste in my mouth, but miscommunications happen, so I agreed to go back. The second time, not a Tuesday, was okay. The third, yesterday, wasn't good.

We showed up hungry and were told after the chips and salsa hit the table that the cook had quit and it would take awhile longer to get our food. Okay we say, we can be patient, we order some guacamole. As always, the food is mediocre - the mole sauce is so sweet my wife doesn't eat more than a couple of bites of her enchiladas, but some folks like it that way.

Where I vowed "Never again." was when I got the bill and saw I had been charged extra for "mild sauce". You see, in the extra half hour or so we sat waiting for our food and eating the 3 ounces of guacamole we ordered to tide us over, we ate the one tiny bowl of salsa we were served for the two of us. And I did request a refill of chips and a second tiny bowl of salsa to eat with our food when it came.

So, two "miscommunications" in three visits leaves me assuming that it's a deliberate policy of either the restaurant or the server to find ways to bump up the bill when no one is looking. I prefer to eat at restaurants where I can trust that I'll be charged what...

I visited this place to spend Taco Tuesday dinner with my son. I don't eat taco shells made with any type of grains, so I requested my taco fillings on lettuce. I was told(by bartender)😏that they don't use that type of lettuce(bam! end of his conversation) I then asked my server if they could put my fillings(1ground beef n 1 chicken) on a bed of the shredded lettuce used along with the lettuce, tomatoes, shredded cheese used for the filling since I wasn't getting the Taco shells. She said yes, they could do that. Yay! I also ordered a Diet Coke to go with the meal. Diet Coke came out 1st, it was extremely flat tasting, no fizz whatsoever, as if it had been poured from a can that had been opened that morning or a fountain with no carbon...YUCK! I asked her to please remove it n bring me ice water which did with her apologies for the soda taste. A young man promptly brought out my tacos but there was no bed of lettuce under them n a scarcity of tomatoes. I asked him to please bring me a plate of lettuce n tomatoes which he did without any to-do. Neither of the two taco fillings were generous portions. I was surprised but did not comment to my server. They mixed my son's order up a bit but did straighten it out to his satisfaction. I really like Tacos but I think I will continue to make them at home since restaurants seem to have issues with orders that are special requests or out of their "normal" preparations. It was a pleasant atmosphere n the seating was arranged in a manner where tables had plenty of social distancing between them. I may revisit though bcuz they had a Spanish coffee drink that looked worth...

Service from the server was good. However, manager on duty needs to learn better customer service. We were there for Taco Tuesday for the first time. The menu seems quite clear as to what and how to order. However, when our bill came we were charged for an IPA beer that we didn't order. The bill came with the name of a beer we hadn't ordered. My likes IPAs so she ordered the only IPA on the the list of draft beers and it and the charge was for a different IPA beer. I asked what craft beers there were and she said they didn't have any at the time. When we pointed it out to the server she said she said that the system automatically puts in the one on the bill for all IPA beer.She said she would talk to the manager and he came out. He then said all IPAs are craft beers. When I politely showed him their own menu saying all draft beers were one price and that we were told there weren't even any craft beers available he stated that the server must have misspoken and he would discuss it with her. However all IPAs are craft beer and did nothing about correcting the bill. This alone lost them a customer who was already making the restaurant high on our list until that. In addition beware of they automatically add the tip to the bill and then at the bottom of the credit card receipt print out suggested amounts of for a tip allowing a customer to make a very easy mistake of double tipping. In fact I normally tip higher than the printed tip and was going to do add the addition his evening until the manager had been...