Alebrijes At the Lighthouse

The Lighthouse is open again. Alebrijes at the Lighthouse closed. Joe’s Sports Bar closed. The restaurant sold again, but this time things are looking up. The new owners, Mark and Wendy, formerly ran a successful sports bar and have reopened the Lighthouse with American cuisine, and a nautical theme. It looks like the restaurant is finally in good hands and will succeed.
The new staff is very friendly and helpful. The food is great, and as always, it’s a terrific location on the Delta Loop.

The Mexican restaurant is CLOSED. It is now Joe’s Sports Bar and Grill. UPDATE: this is now Lighthouse Restaurant.

The Mexican Food last year was YUMMO but now it is a sports bar. The food was ok but nothing great. mostly fried stuff. Nice view of the Mokelumne and they have live music on the weekends (not sure exactly what days). Lots of TVs throughout if you want to catch some sports.

The Lighthouse recently changed formats, and is now a great Mexican restaurant.
My family and friends are members at the Lighthouse campground, so we of course had to try the new place out.
While they have a few kinks to work out in their dining room, the food was great! The tableside guacamole was excellent, and the carnitas plate that I had was probably one of the best carnitas I’ve ever had. And I know carnitas!
The owner/​manager/​head chef (I’m not sure if its one or all) came out during our dinner and was very engaging and passionate about his business.
Also, their «Skinny Margaritas» are really good but they need a real bartender in there!!!
Nightlife there rocks as they usually have good live music on the weekend nights.

It was a long drive out to have dinner on the river. I think the restaurant is new and I am giving them 3 stars because I feel that they deserve the benefit of the doubt. I assume that over time, they’ll get better. I hope.
Let me start by listing the positives…
The carnitas were pretty good and the table side guac was delish.
The negatives…
The service was «off». Our waiter was very talkative and nice and tried his hardest to be everyone’s buddy. The place wasn’t that busy, so we couldn’t understand why drinks took so long when we ordered. When the waiter checked back to see how the drinks were, to be honest, they tasted like cheap margarita mix with some tequila. Not impressed. I could have made the same thing (but better) at home. Our table ordered another round of drinks, which also took forever, and when they came out two people’s drinks were forgotten.
The chips and salsa ran completely out for a while before they were replenished and the food was just okay.
The people that we went to dinner with made it fun, so if they invite us back, I’d give them another try. This restaurant has a lot to live up to if it wants to come close to comparing with their Lodi location. I think one more waiter/​waitress would have sped things along.
I’m optimistic for them.