La Hacienda Mexicana

Doesn't Recommend

mack e.

Joined 1 year ago

Awful, awful, awful.. We had eaten here several times and really enjoyed it. The food was (is) great, but the service is a bit slow. It wasn't enough to make us not go back though. After tonight though, we will never go back.

It started out great, everyone was happy with their food. We had a very nice woman as a waitress-we hadn't seen her there before and it was obvious she was semi-new, but she was very nice and helpful. We were about 3/4 of the way through the meal, when we noticed a small cockroach crawling across one of our napkins. Coincidentally, our waitress happened to walk up to the table, and she killed the bug. She walked away with the bug in a napkin with a disgusted look on her face, looking like she was about to either cry or throw up. She went into the back and we sat there waiting for a good 10 minutes, not eating anymore. Then, we saw her storm out the front door with all her things, looking quite angrily. We sat there being ignored for another 5 minutes, before another waiter came over to ask if we needed refills, as if nothing had happened. We told him what had happened and he acted like he didn't know anything (there were only a few other people in the restaurant, so he obviously would have noticed it) and ignoring our story. We were ignored a little longer, and the waiters continued to be evasive and unhelpful. We were ready to leave, and we asked for the manager, and he too was rude and evasive, obviously expecting us to pay the full bill after everything that had happened. He said he would call the owner, and he came back blaming the incident on the shopping strip the La Hacienda is located in. We weren't happy with this explanation, and he again talked to the owner. Finally, he said we could leave, but never talked about the incident or our waitress who had quite apparently either quit or been fired. Even when we asked about the waitress, feeling bad for her (she had done nothing wrong whatsoever), they again acted liked nothing had happened.

I know some people pull this "cockroach in the food" trick to try to get free meals, but we are not that kind of people. It's not unusual to see cockroaches in Florida, and we didn't blame them for it, but the way they handled was completely inappropriate and rude. Overall, the experience quickly went bad, and we will NEVER go back again.