Las Glorias

Where: Las Glorias, 750 E 1065 S, Orem UT

Who Went: Roy and Heather

Number of Visits: 1

What I Ordered: 

• Chicken tamale, Beef enchilada, 
• 3 Chicken Smothered burritos

What It Cost: $24.62 (before tip)

What I Thought:

Avoid! Avoid!

Okay, I had to get that out of my system first.

Roy and I love Mexican food, so when we recieved a few coupons for Las Glorias, we decided to try them out. (Though we ended up not being able to use the coupon...which caused another waste in this experience.) On the drive up there, I found three reviews for this place, and all of them were pretty negative overall. But, we were already there, we had plans for after dinner (so there was the time frame to consider), and we like trying new restaurants, so we decided to give it shot anyways. 

Bad idea.

We went in and there were only about three other groups of people in the place (not busy=kinda nice, but wonder why, on a Saturday night, it's so empty...). So we were seated right away, on hard benches that hurt my hips by the end of the meal. The first server looked like a depressed young kid whose face never changed emotions the whole time. And after he seated us, he kinda just wandered around doing nothing the rest of the time we were there.

Our first thought at looking at the menu was this place seemed to be a very Americanized Mexican restaurant, so that was a red flag to me. We got our drinks and chips/salsa quickly though, and the water with my lemon was actually good. Little did I know that would be the only good thing coming... The chips looked/tasted like they had just been opened from a store bought bag and had this weird seasoning on them that Roy and I couldn't figure out what exactly it was. And then the salsa. This was my biggest disappointment of the night, since chips and salsa at a Mexican restuarant are the main reasons I go in the first place!

 It's consistency and look was like ketchup (a comment from the reviews we had read had warned of that); pasty and un-salsa like. It was spicy, which was nice, but I'm not a fan of "salsa" that just slides down your throat like a thick, raw egg. Salsa should have chunks in it! This one looked/tasted like it came straight from a can.

Needless to say, my favorite part of the meal, I had hardly any of :(

I wanted to leave right then and there, since we hadn't ordered yet by the time I had tasted the salsa, but I couldn't convince Roy. He felt embarrassed to leave, since we had already been seated. I offered to be the one to apologize and explain so that we could leave, since I knew I wouldn't want to waste money on a restaurant that had no great reviews already and it's salsa was like ketchup. Alas, we stayed, and I tried to tough it out, though I think I just pouted the whole way through. And here's more good reasons why:

The waitress took our order, not writing anything down, so I worried about that. I got a shredded beef enchilada and a chicken tamale --enchilada style (there was no option for a beef tamale). I also wanted Horchata, since that was the one good thing the reviews had said about the place, but they were out of it. (Making me wonder, how could they be out of it if it's not even busy in here?)

When the food finally came, I didn't even bother to take a picture of mine right away (Roy got one taken after I had eaten most of it) because I wasn't impressed.

My enchiladas I make at home are 100000000x better than this.

First off, the tamale wasn't there. The girl said it would be coming out "shortly." (I think she just forgot to include it in the order. We heard her in the kitchen messing up someone else's order later that night too) Half-way through our meal, after I had finished the enchilada by a long shot, it finally came. Anyways, back to my plate.
It came with a few cut tomatoes, and some lettuce that looked wilted and old. The enchilada itself was covered in cheese and sauce, which seemed promising. However, after cutting into it, I realized HALF of it had absolutely no meat in it. Half! The tortilla was soggy (another warning we read about in the previous reviews) and the sauce, though not disgusting, tasted like it was out of a can from Smith's Grocery. The shredded beef was pretty good, though the sauce overpowered most of it's flavor (again, already warned of this in the review, so I'm guessing those reviews were correct). What you see in the picture is about a third of the enchilada left, where there's only a ton of rubbery cheese and soggy tortilla left, since I couldn't force it down without meat. I sat playing with the sauce the rest of the meal.

Finally my tamale came, but surprise, surprise, it wasn't the way I ordered it. I wanted it enchilada style, made sure to state it that way to the girl, but it came out just a plain old chicken tamale with hardly any meat in it as well. We didn't even bother taking a picture, but if we had, you'd see about half of it left because it was all just the breading part, no meat left inside. Worst waste of money.

Now Roy's turn:
I will keep this simple.  The burrito sauce was pretty good but I could tell it was not freshly made.  Also, the tortillas are like store bought flour tortillas, so they got soggy really fast. As leftovers, it didn't taste so great either.

 The salsa was more like paste.  It was spicy but it was not salsa.  It was more like eating enchilada sauce with chips.  There wasn't really anything great about this place.

Oh and some advice to the men.  If your significant other wants to leave, LEAVE!

And I'll add a tiny bit, since I tasted his: the chicken tasted like the chicken that's in my Cambell's soups I take to school when I have nothing else for lunch. It was not good.

What you should do: Avoid. Obviously, from my rant about the food and service, it's no secret I'll be telling people I love (and random strangers) to skip this place. (I even mentioned it to some strangers waiting to be seated while we walked out. No need for anyone else to get disappointed/waste their money). And one of the worst parts: No leftovers for me the next day (Roy had some)! That's another one of the best parts of Mexican restaurants; getting to continue enjoying the food the next day. *sigh*
For the experience, price, food quality, and service getting my order wrong, we say: skip it entirely and go to Mama Chus in Orem instead (review to come!)

El Mexsal Restaurant

Where: El Mexsal Restaurant, 325 S Freedom Blvd, Provo

Who Went: Roy and Heather

Number of Visits: 1

What I Ordered: 

• Beef tamale, Beef enchilada, 
• Beef and bean burrito with chile relleno combo
• Pupusa Revuelta (cheese, beans, pork)

What It Cost: $17.50 (before tip)

What I Thought:

Roy and I are always on the look-out for good Mexican restaurants in our area, and fortunately, we've found a few places that are muuuuuch better than Los Hermanos (review to come). We heard about this little mexican place and were excited to try it out.

First, the chips and salsa. First impression for both of us: Woo hoo! The chips were still warm and the salsa was perfectly spicy. But, as the minutes passed, I started to notice how quickly the chips turned cold (which was fine) but what I disliked was how hard they became. Crunchy is not the way I'd describe these (because crunchy is good and what we want). They were hard and I found them sticking my gums and mouth and hurting them. But maybe that's me being too overcritical. The salsa was amazing though! Super flavorful and spicy (Roy and I like spicy food a lot, so we were happy). It was a little watery, but the flavor made up for it.

This is Roy here.  I just wanted to add that they were delicious!  

First to arrive, our AMAZING Pupusa. Filled with pork, cheese, and beans, I couldn't wait to try it. Roy raved about Pupusas from his time in Nicaragua so I jumped on it when it came, and burnt my tongue! But it was worth it, because it was tasty! The tortillas were perfectly crisp.

The Pupusa had good texture as my wife has pointed out and the flavor was great.  Comparing it to other pupusas though, I thought it lacked in cheese and beans.  But it had plenty of meat and flavor to make up for it.  All and all, it was great to eat pupusas again and it was super cheap ($2).

Then, my dish of a beef enchilada and beef tamale came, with beans and rice. The rice was the best Mexican rice I've ever had. Even Roy, who dislikes mexican rice, said it was good. The beans were delicious as well. Nice and creamy, hot, and with good cheese on top. The beef enchilada was very good. The meat was savory and the tortilla was anything but dry. The tamale was another story. While the meat was alright, the masa (the corn dough around the meat) was kind of gross. I couldn't get over the texture. It was squishy and mushy and made it super hard to finish. I wouldn't get it again.

Now for my dish.  You can already tell from the picture that this will be delicious, and it was!  The burrito had a slightly crispy tortilla with plenty of moist meat.  The rice also had more flavor than most other restaurants, which is a huge plus in my book.  For those that don't know, the Chile Relleno is a pepper filled with cheese and covered in cheese and some fried dough.  It was not too spicy which is important considering some people don't like a lot of spice.  The last few bites had turned quite cold but that is my fault for being a slow eater.  The salad was good, but I felt it was too fresh for a mexican restaurant, meaning the flavor did not mix as well as I had hoped.  Overall, though, this plate was very good and very filling for such a cheap price.

Roy was pretty excited that this came with our food. The right is more salsa, which was great, since we were out just a short time after we got there since it was so good. However, they never refilled our chips, so it was pretty pointless... which was sad...

Anyway, on the left is ensalada, which Roy had in Nicaragua. I didn't try it, because I've had some before and didn't like the dish. But Roy tried it and said it was nothing special.

Overall, we liked the place, and they gave a lot of food for the price. We were pretty bummed that our chips weren't refilled, but we were really full by the end of it anyways. It's a family owned business, so it's cute. The environment from the outside is a little disappointing, but once we were inside, it was fine.  I did feel a little out of place, however, because we were the only white Americans in the establishment. But I guess that just means it was really good food!

What you should do: Go! Overall, it was full of flavor and for a good price. And you'd be supporting a cute family in their business!

Why we're here!

Hello and welcome! My name is Heather and my husband, Roy, and I wanted to start this blog because we love to go out to eat and want to write reviews about our experiences. First thing you should know about me: I hate to cook. Which is mainly why we go out to eat so much... Lately, we've been trying new restaurants around the Provo/Orem area because we're tired of the same three we usually go to. 

So, after we go out to eat, we'll post our reviews here for you to read. In this way, you'll be able to decide for yourself what restaurants you'd like to try, and which you won't have to waste your time on.

Happy dining! 

~Roy and Heather