Carlos O’kelly’s Mexican Cafe

Queso is amazing, chips are made on site and usually warm, salsa is made on site and delicious. Anything on the menu is great, you can’t go wrong! You can get a lot of food with their combo meals. The water is not that good, order a lemon. Food arrives very quickly.

We LOVE going to Carlos. Especially the cedar falls restaurant, since they’ve changed the waterloo one.
If you don’t think the Carlos chips, salsa and queso are the best, then you’re broken!
The environment is family friendly, budget friendly and relaxing.
Don’t know what to try? Enchiladas San Carlos, cinco sampler and prairie fire grilled steak are some of our favorites.
And if you’re still hungry, try some fried ice cream — yum!

A lot of talk about this place since we moved here. After trying this place out I’m not sure what the hype its about. Very bland and not at all authentic.

Oh Carlos O’Kelly’s how I have missed you since I moved to Minnesota. Is it authentic? No, but do I love it anyway, absolutely! I and a friend from high school stopped in last night for supper and a margarita. We ordered a dish of queso to go with the complimentary chips and it was a perfect combination of warm, gooey cheesiness with a kick.
She ended up ordering the Seafood Vera Cruz enchilada with a Raspberry Margarita and I ended up getting the Chipotle Chicken Burrito with a Orange-​Mango Margarita. My burrito had just the right of kick where it was spicy but not so much that you couldn’t stand it. The burrito came with choice of sides so I opted for the refried beans and cilantro lime rice. I felt the rice could have used more cilantro and lime as it was a little too bland for me. The Margaritas are pretty good size, I would say like 22 – 32 ounces and $ 4.99, you really can’t go wrong.
Our waitress was attentive without being intrusive which was great as my friend and I were catching up after not seeing each other for while. The waitress made sure that we had everything that we needed and made sure to let us know that our food was on the way as it had been a little bit since we ordered. In fact, no sooner than she had said that our food should be out shortly, another server was right behind her with our food.
Carlos, I will be dreaming of you until I can come back to visit when I’m back visiting Iowa.