El Rio Grande, Florence, KY (A Tale of Three Restaurants, part 2)

My birthday was almost three weeks ago and for my birthday dinner, I really wanted to go to a Japanese steakhouse. But alas  my big day fell on a Sunday and opting for lunch was the plan...hoping a more affordable lunch menu would be available. It wasn't. Our favorite Chinese restaurant is no longer open on Sundays, my parents were in town just a few days before and taken the kids and I to one of my favorite chain restaurants (Abuelos), the two younger girls and I had eaten at another local Mexican place just a week before, so I really didn't have my heart set on Mexican food. But it was conveniently located next to the Japanese steakhouse we were choosing not to frequent in order to save money and we had eaten there a few times before and thought that it would be doable for our family.

To summarize, it wasn't the best birthday meal I've ever had.

Now I know people are loyal to their favorite Mexican food, but out of the three restaurants I'm rating here, I would place this one at the bottom (but it's a close call with second place). They do offer a lunch menu but for our family, it was still too expensive, averaging $10 per person (including tip). It's been a few weeks, but to the best of my memory, we had two teens ordering nachos (as usual), I had a chicken chimichanga (which was just okay), Abbey ordered veggie fajitas (pricey and were doused in corn oil and she barely touched because of it), don't remember what Dale had, but he did like it and one kids meal of chicken fingers and rice that she really didn't care for. The water here is also tap and not very tasty. 

Three things that will have me think twice before I go back are these: 

• The teen who ordered beef nachos ate very few because he said "they smell like poo". They apparently didn't taste like poo, but he couldn't get past the smell. 
• The cost, even for lunch was too much for the quality of food, compared to El Mariachi.
• And lastly, I went along with the big sombrero on my head and everyone singing to me for my kids laughs, but when you bring out the free fried ice cream in honor of my special day, please be certain that it is not wrapped in stale corn flakes and laying on a stale tortilla and definitely don't stick your finger into the dessert you just brought me and proceed to put whip cream on my nose. Not cool, dude...not cool. (Note: I did not complain and we all sort of nervously chuckled in shock that he would brazenly do that. In our family Noah and I are probably the only two that could somewhat laugh that off. If it had happened to the others, not so much.)

So there you have it. I don't really like to pan a place and we have eaten there a few other times with better experiences, but never as a whole family. I don't think it will be high on our list of priorities to return, especially with a much better alternative that we have closer to home.