El Rancho Grande

Good tasty salsa, friendly service and really fast –and margaritas are delish– The atmosphere is family oriented but just what u would expect. Overall great experience and authentic food!

This is the second time we dined here. I was much more impressed the first time than this past Saturday. My husband and I arrived for dinner. The restaurant was not busy. We were seated immediately, and a man brought us chips and salsa a few minutes later. Then things went downhill. We sat there for about 20 minutes before a waiter/​waitress came to greet us and take a drink order. We did not know who our server was, but servers did walk by, and no one stopped by our table. There was a waitress with long blonde hair that didn’t seem to be busy with diners, but was busy flirting with the two bartenders, the bar being right across from us. I finally caught the eye of one of the hostesses, and motioned that we had been sitting there a while. She rushed to us, apologized, and said she would find our waitress. Lo and behold, it was girl that was spending her time talking and laughing with the bartenders! The waitress acted like nothing was wrong and never apologized. By this time, we weren’t as interested in the meal as the mood had changed. Our meal came out in minutes once we ordered, which made us think the food is all prepared in advance. The rice and beans were average. The hostess apologized again on our way out, but I think we should have been given an adjustment on our bill or a free dessert. Something. Don’t think we will be going back anytime soon. Staff seemed to be more interested in their social game with each other than being focused on their job and providing a pleasant dining experience.

We showed up for dinner and my wife wanted to wash her hands. She went into the bathroom and there was no soap. Am employee came in to clean the restroom and she said that they were out of soap and has been all day. We asked to speak with the manager and asked if this the bathroom that the employed use and she said yes. We informed her that her employees could not wash their hands. She was irritated about being asked about the lack of soap so we decided to not eat there and will not go back. Who wants to eat at a restaurant where employees cannot wash their hands.

Should have checked Unilocal before going… The food was overpriced and very underwhelming. The rice was bland, as was the entrée feature. Enchiladas Mexicanas were incredibly dry and had next to no flavor. I left quite a bit on my plate and did not ask for a to-​go box. Disappointing experience. Only positive was the drinks. Bottled beer and a strawberry margarita went down just fine.

Monster portions good tastes. Service was ok but our waitress was learning so hopefully will be quicker next time.

10-​year Favorite!
We have been coming here for over 10 years, and Pete (the owner) is still serving up great food! We have never had a bad meal at El Rancho Grande! NEVER. We love that every holiday, the big ranch is decorated inside to match the holiday theme! The normal décor of John Wayne and The Alamo are a pleasant experience for all, not just history buffs! It really creates a Texas/​Mexican atmosphere inside with the lights, décor and music. My son loves the life size statue of John Wayne and my husband appreciates the history of the Alamo and the republic of Texas. I love the beautiful Native American artifacts.
Now the food: fabulous! Authentic Tex-​Mex style food. Try the sizzling hot fajitas! Or a massive plate of nachos! Our personal favorite is the Brocheta de Filet and the Carne Asada. Both are excellent dishes and you cannot go wrong! Order extra bacon with the Brocheta, it’s worth it! Their Cameron shrimp dinner is also excellent. Ernesto is a fabulous chef and he makes each plate beautiful and amazing!
Drinks: they have a full service bar that can make happy hour last all day! Try the frozen margaritas– strawberry is my favorite!
Service: excellent as always. Ask for Sara or Katie– they are super friendly and will take good care of you! Manny was another favorite, but retired from the restaurant over a year ago. Everyone is friendly there. There is also a covered porch if you want to sit outside.
Don’t miss a chance for great Tex-​Mex and Mexican food. Try the Xangos for dessert– deep fried cream cheese crunchiness! Awesome! Cant say enough good things about his restaurant!

Amazing! Delicious salsa! Fresh! Fajitas were delicious! Great service too. We are on vacation in the area and ate here last year! We will come back every year! The kids meals were wonderful!

First time we had ever been there. The place was busy. The wait staff was all very young and seemed confused. We sat for a long time before someone came for our drinks. After about 15 minutes, two other tables were seated next to us. Then our food order was taken. However both other tables got their food about 10 minutes before my husband and I got ours. We both got tacos. Steak and chicken. Corn and flour shells. Both of us agreed they had very little meat and almost no flavor. One of my husband’s steak tacos appeared to mostly be burnt bits scraped from the grill.
However, the worst thing happened in the restroom. When I went to wash my hands there was no soap. One if the waitstaff was also I there so I told her. She said «I told them a while ago but it takes forever to fix anything around here». So now I know that not only can I not wash my hands but neither can the waitstaff when they leave the washroom. Yuck!!!

While on vacation we thought we would check out el rancho grande. Don’t waste your time. The complimentary salsa, if you can even call it that, was basically Campbell’s tomato soup and the chips were stale. I had the chicken tacos which had no taste and my wife had a burrito that was also bland. We asked for some queso dip and were informed they didn’t have it. What Mexican restaurant doesn’t have queso dip? You really have to try to make Mexican this bad. For this, one star.

Solid Mexican place we ate at while staying in New Buffalo. There’s nothing here you haven’t had before and it’s certainly not as bad as the reviews would lead you to believe.

Not a bad joint at all. The food was decent, we had no complaints. Strong, inexpensive margaritas! Great atmosphere with fun décor, though I would like to note that we sat in a booth with stained glass depicting a cowboy shooting a bison (New Buffalo’s Mascot)! Our server, Emily, was excellent! She truly went above and beyond to make our experience at El Rancho memorable. We’ll be back next time we’re in town.

El Rancho Grande tries really hard to be a upscaleTex/​Mex restaurant, but in our experience it delivered largely bland and forgettable meals. Example being– I like good Mexican rice and what was served with my meal looked like rice that had been boiled in slightly colored water– with absolutely nothing else added!
The complementary chips appeared to be baked rather than fried and the salsa served was on the thin and runny side; pretty much what you’d come up with if you watered down a Pace or other mass produced jar-​salsa.
Our server was very nice and attentive so that was a plus. The interior was well decorated but didn’t look much different than thousands of other similar places. I felt that it was nice that El Rancho Grande has Dos Equis amber beer on tap and you can get it in a 32 ounce size or a pitcher in addition to a normal size glass.
It appeared that this, at least on the night when we were there, was the place to take your young children and have them run around causing the servers to try their best to not run over the small fry while waiting tables.
Overall our experience was not bad but we felt that there was not a lot memorable at El Rancho Grande to draw us back for another visit.

Friendly staff, Great place to work, Owner is really nice and keeps an eye out for his employees and customers. In walking distance from the beach/​town

The complimentary chips/​salsa is fantastic! Staff is great, friendly and when asked gave us their honest opinion.
My friend had the red sauce but the waitress told her about another red sauce that had a bit more flavor and a little kick, she swapped sauces and loved the dish.
The rice is a bit bland but drinks are great and décor is wonderful.
Great place for Tex-​Mex

Yuck. I do not recommend anything here, poor food, poor service.

Not as bad as some people are making it out to be. Pitcher of margaritas for $ 20, fresh chips and salsa. Service was good. For being your only choice of a Mexican restaurant in new buffalo, wasn’t bad at all.

Ambiance is okay, and the service is good. I’d even say the drinks are good.
The food is not good. It looks okay but isn’t even acceptable as americanized tex-​mex. It’s just bad. Mole flavorless, shrimp microscopic, everything underseasoned and underspiced. Bland.
I hadn’t checked Unilocal first, I’m not at all surprised to see a 2.5 rating, my thoughts exactly.

I’m surprised by the disappointing reviews as I’ve only had delicious food and a positive experience. Perhaps they’ve made some changes since the last review posted.
Food:
The chips are on the greasy side, but they are so tasty. The salsa has a medium spiciness and is a thin style vs. chunky. I get the veggie burrito and my husband the seafood tacos. El Rancho Grande makes my favorite burrito suizo. I was able to customize my burrito to swap out different ingredients, but when my husband asked for one taco of each seafood offerings rather than picking one for all three tacos he was told that he could only pick one. To drink, he ordered Malbec which he said was surprisingly good and he was served a huge portion. I had a margarita which was good, but not very strong and with ice only took about 4 sips before it was gone.
Service:
The service was good. It took our server a little while to check in on us when we arrived and we had to ask for waters, but overall it was fine.
Dining:
This place has one of my favorite Mexican restaurant decors. There are knick-​knacks everywhere and, my favorite, a saloon style room with Indian statue. Really great ambiance.
This will always be a destination when in town for the tasty food.

Visited here last night with my family lets just say we all left EXTREMELY disappointed. The food was so bland an just blah it was the first time I’ve ever had to season my food at a Mexican place. We even ordered dessert to try to make up for the monotone dinner and I got the red velvet rum cake on special and it was neither rum nor red velvet, it had a blackened bottom and cheap shortening frosting. Not to sure a return visit will occur here. Worth the drive to go down a few miles to hacienda.

Visited El Rancho with my sister last week. We ordered the ubiquitous margaritas and they were good. Our waitress was very attentive and sweet. I ordered the beef taco dinner; my sister also had the taco dinner, but with pork filling. We also split a pork enchilada.
The tortilla chips and salsa were tasty, the enchiladas were yummy, but both orders of tacos were bland. Maybe the taste is geared toward the myriad of children who frequent the area in the summer? Even so, I’ll definitely return