La Parrilla No 1

I’ve passed this place many many times over the years, but never stopped in until yesterday evening. It seems that the restaurant has just reopened under new management, and I gotta love it when that happens — the staff was almost TOO solicitous and they went above and beyond to make sure we were satisfied.
My spouse and I were there with our two young children, and the kids’ menu had the typical range of choices, with a couple more options than we are used to having.
Most of the adult menu is in Spanish, which I can read but my spouse cannot. The owner was the one taking our order, and he made certain we knew we could/​should ask if we had any questions. My spouse ordered a couple of enchiladas, and the owner asked if he would like to try (same price) the tricolor enchiladas instead. It was a nice sampling of the various sauces — verde, red, and a white cheese. My spouse also chose the red rice and black refried beans as accompaniment. All were tasty fare, and the enchiladas were full of shredded chicken. The black beans were definitely more flavorful than my daughters’ pinto refrieds, and all the adult enchiladas had a little bit of a kick to them (but not *spicy* per se).
I don’t recall the name of what I ordered, but it was essentially a kebab of meat and vegetables, accompanied by rice and a bowl of charro beans. The charro beans were some of the best I’ve had in Austin, full of flavor and chunks of bacon. The skewer was good as well, the chicken and beef were tender and flavorful, there was more bacon (never ever a bad thing!), and the peppers and tomatoes were great. The «sausage», however, was basically chunks of hot dog, which was kind of strange. I definitely think the restaurant needs to switch that to something closer to actual sausage.
The owner also brought out what he called «small» cups of beverages for us to «sample». All of these were far from small, and definitely a surprise. The hibiscus and tamarindo agua frescas were not oversweet, and a hit with both kids. The horchata was my favorite of the three drinks, and I had to keep myself from drinking the whole thing!
Oh, I nearly forgot. The salsa was very good, but if you’re looking for a cool fresca style salsa, then theirs is not for you. They serve up a warm salsa that was unexpected, but definitely full of flavor!
I think they did not charge us for our 4-year-old’s kids-​nachos, so the other three meals came out to about $ 22. Not bad, and we would definitely come back to try breakfast or lunch!
We would definitely come back, I wouldn’t mind trying out lunch or breakfast fare.

Great beef fajitas, grilled with green peppers and onions. Used to be even better when they grilled potatoes with the fajitas. Good spicy salsa with chips, and they give plenty of rice, beans, and they will give extra tortillas.
Very good place, nice people, owner or manager usually speaks english, or you can just say fajitas para dos (or uno) por favor, beef, flour tortillas.

Surprised that there aren’t more reviews of this place! This is a fantastic lunch spot. Don’t order off of the menu– have the lunch buffet instead! I don’t think anyone that works here speaks English and their clientele is mostly hispanic. A big win as far as I am concerned. One of my favorite lunch spots in Austin. I believe that they stay open very late (4am or so), so this could make a great after club spot as well. Enjoy!

…i dug into the chile relleno. it struck me that the red sauce surrounding it was a little watery. the shrimp inside was plentyful, but they were the tiny popcorn shrimp variety. not what I expected for some reason. kinda dissappointed, but it tasted good enough and I was hungry as f*ck. I ate on.
read the rest of my review from my taco blog here: