Gringos

Avoid Gringos like the plague. I can give you an almost 100% guarantee that if you buy an El Paso burrito kit and follow the instructions on the back you will end up with something significantly better & more cost effective than this. Does not the deserve the great location. The only thing worth ordering on the menu is the trio of dips but that’s because you can’t get con queso anywhere else in Adelaide.

Gringos is in a great location where it can draw in the passing tourists coming off the beach and looking for a meal.
On our recent visit there was quite a large crowd despite the recent opening of another Mexican restaurant just down the road.
Honestly the food was nice but it didn’t blow us away. And I found it a bit annoying that orders have to be placed at the bar instead of having table service.

I have to say that firstly, Mexican food is a part of the culture of where I was born and grew up, from Southern California. So naturally, I have expectations, but I’m always open-​minded to what Australia has to offer in terms of Mexican food.
Service: Staff were friendly and attentive.
Pricing: A little expensive for what I’m used to here, so I did expect good quality food.
Food: My partner ordered the chilli con carne and he was quite happy about it. He –is– used to a more chunkier kind of chilli con carne, with chunks of meat, but otherwise loved the seasoning, texture, and spice of the meal.
However, I ordered the tacos with shredded beef. I had forgotten to take a picture, but I received two nicely sized hard shelled tacos with the fillings of grated cheese, shredded beef, and salsa rojo (from bottom up), with a whole bunch of shredded lettuce covered all over it. I found my tacos were cold, the meat was not hot (it wasn’t ice cold either of course), but rather lukewarm or even cooled down with all the other fillings combined. I was disappointed to find the beef was dry and bland – completely opposite to what I’m used to for taco filling.
Overall though the portions were big, with a side of rice and salad with our main meals.
Afterwards my partner talked with the head chef of the place and the chef was shocked to hear my tacos were overall cold, and that the meat was supposed to be warm. She had me try the meat filling straight from the kitchen, and from what I gathered the beef was flavourful, spicy, still dry in my opinion, but it was much better than the serve I had received from my meal! She thanked us for letting her know of our goings-​on, and we left.
In conclusion, I’m only disappointed on the flavour of my meal and I’m still willing to give this place another go. I might have a try at the entrées next time or maybe even the enchiladas. If the next time is a great experience I’m more than willing to improve the rating of my review.

Gringos have always been one of those places that I have been meaning to try for a long time, and now I can finally say I’ve ticked that off my list! The main highlight of Gringos is probably their location, right across from the square, you can choose to sit outside and bask in the rays and people watch or sit inside.
On this occasion we had a few drinks at the Moseley, food was next on the agenda and Gringos was only a short walk to get food in our bellies.
From reading a few reviews on Unilocal — there seemed to be a risk of waiting and me and my man were both ravenous so we asked to have both our starter and mains come out together.
Fortunately it wasn’t long before our food arrived, I had the enchilada and my man had the soft burrito and we shared the nachos. The servings were quite generous and the nachos had a heap of toppings. We definitely did not leave hungry with the amount of food we ate between us.
I had a good enough experience here — gets the A-​OK from me!

We shared a plate of nachos, they were quite delicious– however I really disliked their toppings being placed next to each other on the nachos. They should have been layered!!!
I ordered the enchilada and really enjoyed it!!!

Went here for bestie’s family 40^th birthday celebration with her family and mine. We ordered as soon as we got there and bestie and husband /​baby had already ordered 15 minutes before we arrived. Ordered a big nachos for the kids and hubby to share, A vego burrito main for the hubby and a combo of vegan sides for me (chef salad, frijoles, jalapenos and guacamole). They asked if we would like it all at once and we said that we would. They were not particularly busy and I kid you not the food took close to an hour to come (bestie and family had already finished and her brother and his family who arrived and ordered not too long after us were still eating when we left as they got theirs as we were finishing), by which time the kids were ready to eat the plates… and I still had to ask another 3 times before my salad came to accompany my accompaniments… The third time I asked the ditzy girl at the counter said — oh so you haven’t got it yet? (um no!!!).
The salad when it finally arrived was good with plenty of fruit and veg (no protien but that is why I ordered some frijoles so no drama). The frijoles came with some pepitas which was a nice touch but the serves of both frijoles and guac were tiny for the $ 5 or so each that they were. I got through the $ 2.50 generous serve of jalapenos though — took that as a personal challenge although they were not overly spicy. Husband said his meal was ok although fairly large. The nachos looked good from the outside but seriously why it needed to have 250gm (I kid you not — see the pic if you don’t believe me) of cheese on it is beyond me. What a waste. Kids and husband ate around most of it.
If you want mexican you can make better at home then by all means come here otherwise you are better off at lucky lupitas or somewhere more authentic. I used to frequent this place some years ago and I think it was better but seriously it’s quite awful now and I won’t be coming back.

A group of us went there last night even after reading the reviews here and found that they have gotten somewhat better.
We were not worried about the quality of service — although there was no issue there — the staff were polite and friendly. They allowed us to split our bills as well.
The décor was not bad and we did not care about the ambience as we were more interested in catching up and the food.
The food — the food was great and filling. Every one of us were filled and really enjoyed the food.
I would definitely go back again!

I visited here a week ago and the group I was with debated going here or to Salsas also at the bay, we decided to go here as we wanted more variety than a ‘fast-​food’ outlet, the environment was quite noisy and there isn’t table service, you have to place your orders at the bar for both food and drinks.
It took a little over 30 minutes for our food to arrive and it tasted quite okay however for the price we would have expected more.

So when I initially walked in no one seated me, so I walked to the bar and smiled at three waitresses chatting amongst themselves, no acknowledgement, I smiled again. Waited. they asked if I was okay, I advised a had a booking and they eventually sat me. I work in hospo and first impressions set the mood, a simple smile and acknowledgement on arrival set the tone, but it was valentines day so I moved on from this.
They have redone the place. I am undecided on whether I like its new do. The old place was shabby but it was a cool-​shabby. The new layout is a bit cold. It reminds me of restaurants in Thailand where they do non-​thai cuisine, a bland room with lots of table and then a few of the countries items around the place, or a sombrero here and there and voila «Mexican restaurant».
It may be the hunger talking, they have tried with the décor it just misses the mark a bit.
Now the food! We ordered corn chips with guacamole to start (ordered from the bar, no table service at 20+ a main?). This came out and the guacamole was delicious and dairy free!
The Mains we got were the Burrito con cena (with no meat) for me, and burrito con cena with beef for my partner. I was charged the same for the Burrito with the removal of meat, but that seems to be pretty standard.
Whilst waiting for our mains we made our way through the better part of a litre of Sangria, but even so I think we had would have enjoyed the food sober. The Burrito arrived with plenty of salad (and chips?). Apparently there is a choice of chips or rice with your meal, and boyfriend had opted for chips with ours. Not very traditional, but points for giving the people what they want.
Overall a pleasant enough experience, but next time due to the cost. vs quality we might just go to share a starter and some sangria.

Spent 90 minutes waiting for our food. There were only 2 other families in the restaurant at the time…
Food was average at best. Would not go back.

Before a few weekends ago, the last time I went to Gringos was somewhere around 2008, and there was a reason there was such a huge gap between visits– my last meal there was terrible! Overpriced, mushy, sloppy food that was an insult to the word «Mexican».
So when my other half and I stopped in after a long walk on the beach (yes, we’re very romantic) around 7 30pm on a Sunday night. I wasn’t expecting much, but thought that we could at least have some chips and salsa.
I was pleasantly surprised! Not only has the restaurant itself had a complete makeover, the food was a world away from my last experience there. Not sure if there’s new management or what, but I could actually eat my vegetarian burrito without feeling sad and despondent about it. We also had the chips, salsa, bean dip and guac as a starter, and they were all a-​ok! Definitely not a perfect representation of authentic Mexican food, but certainly a tasty and flavourful meal for a reasonable price.
We washed everything down with a respectable litre of sangria. It was cold and fruity and delicious and helped bump the meal up a notch.

Went here again, much better!

I used to love this place. I used to be very happy here with a serve of nachos and a BIG serve of sangria. But sometime within the last few years it’s either changed hands, or for another unknown reason, it went really downhill. Downhill to the point that I can’t bring myself to eat here anymore. Nothing tastes very fresh or flavoursome and even the sangria tastes weird to me, it’s a modern tragedy. The only upside is two of my friends were literally addicted to this place and now they can’t stand it either, so every cloud has a silver lining. In a nutshell — not great Mexican!

Despite the three star rating my friends and I love coming here… I think Mexican can be cheap and dirty and you can still love it — especially with enough Sangria.
I suppose the problem is it’s not always cheap here. It is, however just off the main Glenelg drag — the Jetty and it’s good for this reason too. You can imagine how successful this place would be if it was on the beach front with lots of outdoor seating but it’s kind of tucked away, without many outdoor tables so you feel seperate from the jetty road scene. A definite bonus in my eyes!
I can recommend beer and Nachos, however… their guacomole is usually pretty top notch and there are a couple of Burritos which are fairly decent too. I would urge you to stick with bean or beef, the chicken is pretty much always disappointing. A lot of the hot ingredients come out of bain maries, so it’s not always the freshest — but it is reasonably quick.
Rohan’s right about the juices — a definite bonus!

Generous serves, but the taste seems over commercialised and lacks authentic flavour.
It has the best freshly squeezed juice you will find in Glenelg (In my humble opinion), also a decent Sangria that will put you on you arse!
My menu order advice is the following:
— Large serve of Nachos (with extra jalapenos)
— Con Queso dip
— Guacamole
— Several rounds of Corona
Conveniently across the road from Mosely Square, it’s great to watch Glenelg go by on a Summer’s day, or watch pedestrians run the Gauntlet between the ice cream shop and Cibo.