Trip Report: Panchos Mexican Superbuffet

[sore_bluto]

Trip report part one: (sorry for the really long post)

I called my brother and asked if I could take him out to dinner. The catch, as he would come to find out, was that I was taking him to an undisclosed location. As we drove through Metairie, he began suggesting restaurants that he suspected we might be headed to. I kept shooting them down, knowing that there was little chance he'd figure it out. As we crossed the railroad tracks on Labarre, I said, "Well, at least you might find this amusing. We're here."

Panchos. Many discussions have been floating around about this "flagship super buffet location in Metairie" (according to the panchos website). This was the perfect test. My brother is ten years older than me. I have no memories of going to the Rosedale Mall location of Panchos as a child, only has a teenager (I think I was 18 at the time). So I asked him if he had any feelings about what we were about to do. He said only, "Sopapillas." It seemed he did remember the place fondly. I, on the other hand, only had negative memories of the place.

You enter the large restaurant through the right hand door into a short queue that leads to a cash register. After a very long wait to process the two groups in front of us, a cashier, with limited English skills charged us for 2 adult meals, 1 soft drink, 1 tea. It was $23.66. We were immediately seated in a dining room that was mostly full. The quarters were pedestrian and fairly cramped but not unbearable and the room was warm. Our server immediately took out drink order, even though she too seemed to struggle with English. It was time to take the plunge.

The dining room and another large dining room are both adjacent to a large central buffet room with colorful plates and many a steam table. The room was surprisingly dark considering that the dining room was brightly lit. Your eyes actually have to adjust like when you come in from outside on a sunny day. Every hot buffet had refried beans and spanish rice along with some choices I expected to see and some out of left field. There were many pans of orange cheese liquid. In the corner of the room there was a woman making tacos to order and at the end of the room there were deserts sitting on a counter. There was a salad bar and a bar with fresh fruits and cold deserts.

The food choices were taquitos, chili rellenos, mini chimichangas, tamales and enchiladas along with the aforementioned orange cheese sauces in a few variants.

It was bleak. Both my brother and I knew it. I grabbed a plate and prodded him to do the same. I picked up a few taquitos, a couple of tamales, a mini chimi, a chili relleno, and some rice. I put some of the orange cheese on the relleno and some chili con carne over chimi. By the time I got back to the table, my brother's tea was there along with a basket of chips and salsa, but my soda was not. The waitress showed up and admitted that she had forgotten what I ordered. She quickly retrieved my drink.

[sore_bluto]

Trip report part two:

The food. Was bad. Really bad. Mind numbingly bad. I did mention that it was bad, right. Oh yeah, and it was bad.

Everything had a gelatinous quality to it. Not because the food was cold, but because it was processed food. Everything in this place emerged from a can, or was reconstituted, or was defrosted. About the only items that were fresh were the flour tortillas and some of the items on the salad and fruit bars. This was exactly as I remembered Panchos many years ago. I was determined to eat at least one bite of everything I took, but my brother wouldn't. He pushed back his plate in disgust and complained about not being able to get a taco. He hadn't seen the taco station, and after I told him, he got up, only to return seconds later sans tacos. He said "There's only the one woman back there and she's on turtle speed. There's a huge line for tacos." In a test of the service, he raised the flag and the waitress responded. He asked her to bring him three tacos. The conversation was a comedy routine, her having to figure out that he wanted her to retrieve the tacos, and then having her figure out what kind of tacos only to have her walk away and come back 15 seconds later having forgotten the entire request. He the told me he would check out the salad bar only to again immediately return, disgusted by the salad dressings. A couple of minutes went by and the waitress returned with only two of the requested three tacos and more salsa. She told him that they had temporarily run out of tortillas.

We talked about the ridiculousness of the situation, and I agreed that I would treat him to someplace nice as payback for submitting him to this experiment. We agreed that we'd both had enough. And then his third taco arrived.

The best item on the panchos buffet (as per my brother) are the soft tacos, although he said that the soft tacos at Taco bell were better, because "at least you could tell the kind of meat you have in there". 2 on a scale of 1 to 10.

In my opinion the best item was the second salsa that I received. The first ramekin was a watery tomato liquid (which I now assume was the "mild" salsa) and the second was what I presume was the "hot" salsa was actually kind of spicy and contained fresh cilantro. Also a 2.

The most egregious items on the buffet were the enchiladas. They were unapproachable. My brother told me that one of the pans had a sauce with a "semen-like" appearance. We were arguing about weather or not this food was on or below the Patio brand standard as we left. Then, as we approached the car, the best moment of the evening. Two men and a woman had just parked their car near mine and the woman was arguing saying, "I really don't want to eat here." One of the male companions replied, "but I love this place." My brother had to stop and tell the group how bad it was. As we drove away, they walked inside.

Panchos. Expletives were used, stomachs were soured, and we skipped the sopapillas. ¡Muy malo!

[dragongrrl]

Oh man. When I was a kid I adored Patio frozen Mexican food. I almost forgot it until you mentioned it.

I only went to Pancho's twice and I would have liked to try it again for old times sake but I guess not. Ick.

[Low-N-Slow]

Regardless of whether or not it has been called a buffet all these years, our collective memory of Pancho's in N.O. is of a cafeteria line with essentially unlimited refills, delivered to-order courtesy of table servers. Quality issues notwithstanding, not even nostalgia is going to prompt me to endure an experience where I have to wait in line to begin with, pay up-front, and then go wait in line again for more tacos, etc.

[Mrs. Fury]

I used to work across the street from the old Metairie one. It was just fine. I didn't know good food back then though. I definitely don't see myself going after the description here.

[Suzy Wong]

WAIT! You left out the most important issue, was there festive Mexican decorative accents? Hanging piñata's? Fake fern and blooms? A fountain? Rustic clay pottery? Cool tile accents? Bright primary colored smocks with flowers on the wait staff?

And was the chilli releno as foam covered sponge like as it used to be? With the requisite glowing liquid "cheese"?

[sore_bluto]

WAIT! You left out the most important issue, was there festive Mexican decorative accents? Hanging piñata's? Fake fern and blooms? A fountain? Rustic clay pottery? Cool tile accents? Bright primary colored smocks with flowers on the wait staff?

And was the chilli releno as foam covered sponge like as it used to be? With the requisite glowing liquid "cheese"?

The dining room I was seated in was out of place with the rest of the restaurant, which was very strange considering that the place just opened. Two-thirds of the place, the buffet room and entry hall/primary dining room was dimly lit and did have a Mexican chotchkie type atmosphere with an orange and red based color scheme. The room I was seated in was unadorned, powder blue and had bright fluorescent lighting with tables that didn't look like they belong in a Mexican restaurant.

The chili rellenos were piled high in a buffet pan. You had your choice of several varieties of day glow orange cheeses as well as chili to top them with yourself. This iteration of Panchos was not a cafeteria line. It was truly a buffet, so you choose sauce to put on it. As far as the relleno itself, it had surprisingly little chili in it and was mostly batter and a quivering block of "cheese" inside. The words "processed cheese food" come to mind.

[Low-N-Slow]

I was really hoping they would have salvaged the massive chandeliers from the Vets location-- the big circular ones with the glass ashtrays for lenses.

[sore_bluto]

I was really hoping they would have salvaged the massive chandeliers from the Vets location-- the big circular ones with the glass ashtrays for lenses.

There was nothing from the old location as far as I could tell. The place really was hardly decorated.

I forgot to add that the wait staff were all wearing some variant of Panchos T-shirt.

[Jerry]

I used to work across the street from the old Metairie one. It was just fine. I didn't know good food back then though. I definitely don't see myself going after the description here.

Now I remember going there on Saturday for lunch when I worked at GEX shoe dept.
It was about 1968....and it was bad then....but cheap.