Chevys Fresh Mex!

Sophia says: Tonight we went to a Mexican restaurant called Chevys. We have been here once before a couple of years ago. When we got there we were seated quickly and got one adult and two kids menus. I ordered pink lemonade and a make-your-own taco off the kids menu. It sounds like you can make your own but it turns out that you just tell the waiter how you want it and he makes it that way for you. But when I got it, it was pretty good! Our food came quickly. On the kid's menu you can pick out 2 sides and 1 dessert that are included, but a drink is 99 cents.  My sides were applesauce and corn tomalito. After our food came, our waiter checked on us once, and by the time we got dessert, he left all of our plates on our table.  For dessert, I ordered the ice cream mini cone but they were out of cones so I had it in a bowl.  They only had vanilla ice cream but I thought it was okay. The restaurant is very big but it's also very cold. I kept my jacket on the whole time I was there.

 2116 W El Camino Real, Mountain View, CA 94040   (650) 691-9955

Josh says: Tonight we had dinner at Chevys! I ordered a cheese quesadilla and carrots and celery and corn tomalito. Our waiter was nice. The restaurant was kind of big. There was a lot of people. The menu looked nice and if you are a kid, they give you crayons and you can color on the menu. And they had drinks like pink lemonade. I thought our service was fast and they gave us chips and they were hot and crunchy.  My quesadilla was delicious. I did not like the celery but I did like the carrots. My dessert was vanilla ice cream and just so you know, they only have vanilla ice cream or jello. I would definitely come back!

Jodie says:  We were seated quickly and our food came quickly and that's the most I can say. I ordered the tortilla soup and it was fine.  Our waiter seemed to lose interest after our initial order and we didn't see him again until the kids were ready for dessert. I was also freezing during dinner. Josh liked Chevys a lot but I'm not sure if I would come back anytime soon.  

Food: ***
Service: **1/2
Atmosphere: **1/2

Overall:

3 Ladybugs!

Taste of Tasmania 2012

And it’s on for young and old – again! The annual Taste of Tasmania, 2012 version. And who better to report back on it here, again, in the world of reality, than cynical old Rita?

I traipsed around there yesterday, which was the opening day, and, according to today’s Mercury, attracted around 70,000 punters through the doors for the day! A massive amount of humanity, and I think they all managed to congregate around Rita, as it seemed to take half my life to get something to either eat or drink!

Positives:

• lots of great, truly Tasmanian food, hence allowing this festival to genuinely live up to its name of Taste of Tasmania
• ‘cleaner’ feeling to the whole environment (ie not so grotty as in the past)
• good representation of producers of food and wine, both small and large
• minimal ‘fast food’ alternatives

Negatives:

• less general seating, leaving you wandering round clutching your plate of cold food, looking for somewhere to perch in order to eat it! We ended up standing and eating when we had exhausted all possible seating avenues. Eventually we obtained one end of a table, but definitely had to ‘serve our apprenticeship’ in order to do so!
• so difficult to make your way around, due to crowds – but Bec and I found the ideal way to tackle this problem! We walked down the middle of the main eating area, between the tables containing everyone sitting down and eating at the bench tables, instead of around the periphery of the ‘room’ as everyone else was doing which was resulting in a walk anywhere in the building taking 20 minutes not 4 seconds! You could SEE where you wanted to go, but just couldn’t get there!

Will I go again? Not sure, but I’m pleased they at long last seem to be getting it right there, in some ways. Fix the seating and you’ve got a firm fan for life!