Rio Grande Mexican Restaurant

07/19/2008 Posted by LizWhite2

I've been here numerous times and have yet to have a bad experience. There margs are tasty, if you like them strong. Being a vegetarian I love the fajitas and nachos. Granted it's not the best mexican food out there, but it's got average prices and a nice atmosphere. Also seating area outdoors - perfect for the hot summer nights! Another good place is Tahona!

05/08/2008 Posted by caitlisbeth

The margaritas are definitely worth going there, but the food is a different story. I refuse to eat there since I found a 3 in. chicken bone in my enchilada. Go for a margarita and chips and salsa, anything more than that is a gamble.

Pros: Margaritas, Service

Cons: Parking, Food

04/29/2008 Posted by Safarigirl

This place ROCKS! Literally, the margs are the best and the food is amazing. Their food is fresh and they don't use any lard in any recipe. Their salsa is heavenly and when you sit on the rooftop, sip a marg and eat a healthy Salad, nothing beats The Rio. The servers are laid-back and friendly. Tahona is a joke compared to this place

Pros: Mexican, Margs, Service

Cons: Parking

04/13/2008 Posted by alicevans

If you think that Azteca is actually good Mexican food, than you might like this place. Otherwise, if you own a tongue, please stay way. Cheap margaritas are ok, but if you want real good Latin food, check out Centro or Tahona Tequila Bar.

Pros: margaritas

Cons: bland food

02/20/2008 Posted by abd1350

I am not from Boulder and was taken here by my friend and wow. I am now Rio obsessed. Their margaritas really are as amazing as they and everyone else says, and the food was fantastic. It's a really fun place to eat and get ridiculous, haha. If I lived there, it would be a bit dangerous for me...

Pros: Margaritas, Ambience

10/19/2007 Posted by man_in_boulder

Unfortunately, I have eaten at the Rio Grande Mexican Restaurant 3 times. Each time was worse than the last. I don't know how it stays in business. On my second and third visits I tried to convince my friends to choose another restaurant (Boulder has MANY) but they wanted to try this one. The wait staff seemed to be waiting for other jobs and ignored every table they had. We had to get up to find them to ask for more water. After a 45 min. wait, our food arrived with the appetizers and everything was OLD and COLD. I see from the reviews that some enjoy the ambiance but, you can't eat the decor. This restaurant is the first place I have ever left less than a 20% gratuity - the service WAS that bad. Yes, we did tell the management of the poor service and food quality but they had obviously heard it many times before and did nothing other than a quick, "Sorry about that." Save yourself the unsavory experience and dine elsewhere!

Pros: Interesting location

Cons: Food and service was unbelievably POOR. Taco Bell has better of both?!?

09/20/2007 Posted by tkm303

I don't ever do this and I created an account just to write this review. I would have to say this was the worst meal I have ever had. The service from the waitstaff was good but the manager was far from it. My visit here a year ago was an exceptional one, so when family from all over the states came for my younger sisters wedding (she is 27), they wanted to visit boulder. I did not hesitate to recommend Rio for a nice dinner. To my surprise the food was aweful (2 of my nieces actually cried) and when the manager came by to see if everything was good I told him "honostley, the food is horrible". He walked away without ANY RESPONSE nor did he try to make things right with us. Hmmm.. so why even ask if you did not get an answer you should be ready for. I was super embarrased I brought in a party of 15, they are lucky I even gave them one star. If you want great food and great service in Boulder, go to Frasca! Your $400.00 will be well worth it there.

Pros: Waitstaff

Cons: Everthing else

09/15/2007 Posted by radhikapradhan

Had an awful experience on Sep 15th . We chose rooftop seating as the day was nice but the service was beyond poor. We waited for 20 minutes in the hot sun and finally had to flag a server to get us water. The hostess did ask the couple of servers on the rooftop to attend to our table but we were ignored. Noone took our order . Finally we got up to leave and thought we would talk to the manager on the way out. She was a witch from hell. Instead of apologizing for the poor service she made excuses as to how busy she was and could not get to the rooftop and there were other things that took priority. She didnot care that we were leaving neither did the other servers. Shame on the management . Cannot even talk about the food or the drinks as we were not given a chance to sample those.

Pros: great rooftop seating on a sunny day

Cons: poor service and unapologetic management

06/24/2007 Posted by kristylsummers

The Rio has really gone down hill. Today, in for a late lunch, the server, while nice, brought out soup (appetizer) with the actual entrees. The Rio is notorious for bad timing. The green chili (which I ordered the regular kind, not the hot kind) that smothered the chicken enchiladas was so spicy it was inedible. After over ten minutes of waiting for the server to come over and take it away, she tried to argue with me that it was not the hot kind. The manager then stopped by, explained that they had "extra hot green chilis" delivered and were trying to warn people before ordering. Clearly, I did not receive this warning. I was so over it that I passed on a comped entree the manager offered (their enchilada sauce is way to tex-mex), and gave me a $5 gift card. Whatever. If you just want a marg and chips & salsa - stop by the Rio. Otherwise, if you are hungry for authentic Mexican food, stop by Rincon del Sol, Sol Azteca or Casa Alvarez.

Pros: Location, salsa, margaritas

Cons: Service (it is almost always poor, except in the bar), cleanliness of the restaurant, food.

11/13/2006 Posted by reniour

Margaritas, Sangrias, House Margarita, salted, surgar, iced, on the rocks. This place is where to go for margaritas. The food is average, getting better but you go to this place for the Margaritas. They have a 3 Margarita limit for a reason, the house is plesantly strong. I recently ate there and they had expanded their menu, their homemade Flan was quite good. Oh must warn you, don't order the sopopeias. Not worth it.