Mariscos El Veneno

I hate to say it, been coming to this place for years and last night on 1÷30÷2016 will be my last. Great seafood, BYOB what more can you ask for? Well cleanliness. Bathrooms were disgusting, toilet paper with excrement on the floor on both men and women’s bathroom. There was no paper towel to dry hands. It was just bad. Water all over the floor. im suprised no one fell. It was a Saturday so my party and I expected a wait and service to be slow, but last night was ridiculous. Should a health inspector pop in and see what we saw, I am sure they would have cited them or shut it down. The owner apparently is letting this place go down in appearance which is a shame. I would post a pic of what we saw but im sure it will be too disgusting to see. Good bye Veneno. No matter how good the food is, I wont sacrifice my health.

Viva Cristo Rey, Viva la hipocrecia viva, viva la desigualdad con los trabajadores viva, viva la explotacion laboral viva.

This place is just an experience. Friendly and efficient staff and insane food. Wear stretchy pants, go with friends and BYOB for the most incredible Mexican seafood experience. Prepare to be stretchered out of here — the portions are enormous, but take up the challenge and you won’t be disappointed.

This place is byob which makes it even better! Food is amazing! As far as price goes aome might say its pricey but I think its fair
Ive been to other seafood places and they charge about thw same if not more and their plates are nowhere near as big or tasty.
There have been times where service is slow because this place gets packed! Weekends is almost a forsure wait, but well worth it. My favorite plates are the camarones empanizadas with a salsa diabla on the side, the ceviche is super good their rice is to die for! And their piña rellena is really really good oh and their camarones ala diabla sooo sooo good spicy! But good!

Good but not as good as the second location down the street. Some dishes are prepared differently and we were unpleasantly surprised.

The best Mexican seafood dishes you can find. Also, BYOB.
I’ve been several times. Most recently, showed up at 8:30 p.m. on a Thursday with 9 people. Was seated right away. Wine was iced. And the food was great.
My favorite dishes are Camarones a la Diabla and la Pina Rellena.

Omg this place suck!!! We order some langostinos and the lady asked me if I want a big plate and we can share with other people, I placed my order and I was gonna share with my coworkers and when I open the plate. Surprise!!! 16 f****g Langostinos for $ 50. I called them back because I thought the order was wrong. the lady said the $ 50 plate come with 16 – 20 langostinos. are you serious? ?? I will never ever come back to this place

To start off let me just say the only reason I’m giving them one star is because they gave me a bomb ass tostada once I got there. But the service is horrible. Not once did our waiter Cesar check on us. We had to get his attention to take our order, brings us drinks and to bring the check. The food itself wasn’t even good. I ordered camarones a la diabla. The chile was sweet at first then it hit you with a burning flavor. It wasn’t a good spicy, it was just burning. While eating I noticed that the shrimps were not clean. I couldn’t eat it after that. There are way better places for seafood

My husband and I was there Thursday! 4÷10÷2014. service was horrible! The food was just unacceptable. First the waitress forgets out drinks… people that arrived after us was getting their food before us. When our food arrived we reminded the waitress about our drinks (took another five minutes to return). My husband received his plate of food completely cold. As if the food was sitting out for a long time. My food was just room temperature. (I didn’t mind since it was shrimp). What I did mind was that my shrimp was not deveined and it disgusted me. We got another waitress attention and asked to heat up my husbands food… she said she’ll tell our waitress and left. When the first waitress returns with our drinks she takes the plate and didn’t return it back until another 10 minutes or so. By then we were pissed. So we decided to just take our food to go. I asked for a box to carry out…15 minutes later I got up to get my own carry out box by the cash registers. When I return to the cashier station to pay… the girl said I shouldn’t pay that much on my bill… I responded with then discount it… she smiles and charged me full amount. Horrible service! I wont say much about the food… I’m thinking they may be trying out a new cook! But I wont return…

What a waste of money. This place is extremely understaffed and the service is slow. There appeared to be only one waitress for the whole restaurant. She forgot my boyfriends order so he settled for their ceviche since I already had my food. The ceviche was strangely dry and looked more like tinga. I ordered the coctel de camaron that came out room temp and not all that flavorful
Definately not going back.
There is a WAY better place up further south on 83^rd and Pulaski.

The food was decent but the price you pay for such a small amount is not worth.

First time at Marsicos El Veneno. First of all, welcome to their world. This is the ultimate «dive» with great seafood. They’re always packed and for a good reason. I don’t know of any other place where you can get fresh seafood cooked right for these prices. It is Nayarit style. Again, welcome to their world. The music, TV and occasional street vendor can be a distraction but the food makes up for it. It’s also BYOB. I noticed a pretty diverse group of people the day I went. Asians, white and black. We had a lobster tail, seafood salad and a soup and we were all pleased. This place is solid which explains why they have a second location 2 blocks down.

Not bad but not the best either. We had Camarones Cucarachas. & red snapper. The Camarones was just ok but the red snapper was really good. They really do give you a lot of food! FYI the menu is in Spanish only but they have pictures of each dish.

I’ve never actually sat down to eat at this place because the lines are ridiculous. But my dad does being food from this ace quite often.
Their ceviche is by far one of the best ones I’ve had. Their Caldos are spicy and delicious.

The food is FANTASTIC! No where else in Chicago will you get better crablegs! And the portion? GINORMOUS!!! The platter is enough for 3 people and you CANNOT beat the price! BYOB to top it off! The waitstaff is very courteous and knowledgeable — a huge plus, especially when they have a dish with the word «cucarachas» in it lol ;D Two things I cannot stand: (1) the drunk guitar player who CAN’T SING and he’s singing in your ear! Don’t bother playing the jukebox because you won’t be hearing what you paid for, and (2) The stream of people coming in to sell you stuff you don’t want. I don’t want to be bothered. I just want to go there and eat my crablegs and enjoy my vino. I highly recommend this place to any seafood lover. It’s the best gem we have in the southside! LUV IT!!!

…don’t get me wrong, I LOVE spicy foods but this place is all sting & no bite! Everything they served tasted like raw celery once the ultra intense sting of their chili stopped burning & I do mean EVERYTHING! It was such a disappointment. I always see it crowded so I had to give it a try. I went to 2 of their locations twice for each spot (to be fair) & each item I ordered tasted like raw celery & super spicy & vinegary hot sauce. If I want spicy celery, I can eat that at home. Save your money or go to a better seafood joint! I’m not trying to be a snob but this is NOT worth checking out.
Worse still was that whenever I asked the staff if they could fix my plate or bring me another since my food was clearly not edible, they just told me that that was how it was SUPPOSED to taste, as that is «Nayarit-​style»! As grossed out as I was, I not only didn’t take any of it to go, but I still had to pay over $ 40 for 2 dishes that I couldn’t eat! I filled up on the side of french fries & went across the street to Huck Finn’s for a Tuna Melt to fill my tummy with seafood!

Been here twice and the place was dirty on both occasions music is super loud plus they have live music (guys that go from table to table asking if you want a song) when it comes to the food saying its decent I think is a big favor. Variety yes
But flavor not so much… Waitress did take her time for everything. And when finally brought our food my friend told her that her food was too salty and believe or not she replied with a big smile and I guess a joke saying «now you don’t have to look for the salt shaker» and that was it. Horrible

Im going to make this review short and simple. I dont want to waste my time saying anything that has’nt already been said. THIS is the first stop I want to make on my birthday. ENOUGH SAID!!! OMG!!! JUST TOTALLY LOVED IT!!! I almost wanna cry!!!

If your a non-​spanishing speaking person, then it can be a little difficult ordering. Most of it was in spanish, and there was descriptions in english, but still the menu is unorganized where it was difficult to read and navigate. Maybe its just me, but I couldn’t for the life of me know what I was looking at.
Anyways, they just need to redesign the menu, thats all. The food was good, the salsa is really hot, but awesome kick to it. The portions are ginormous, but you get what you pay for here. More like a three dollar sign I think. I could only compare this place to Lapalapa on archer. There is definitely more of a variety in flavors here though.

Let’s just say that I have tried to like this place so much.
I have been to this restaurant about 5 times and I have never had a good dining experience here. For this review, I will write only about the worst time here.
I came here with 2 friends on a Sunday afternoon. It was packed and we had to wait about 40 mins to be seated. Once seated, we ordered water and a drink for each, 2 appetizers, 2 pinas rellenas (stuffed pineapple) and a huachinango al mojo de ajo (fish on garlic sauce).
We asked the waitress that we wanted to receive the main entrees at the same time as we were there to have dinner together. She assured us that we would get them at the same time.
Well, let’s say that things did not go quite the way we had wish for.
After about 20 mins that she took our order we got the drinks. The water on disposable plastic cups, mmmm not expected but all well.
So this is where it gets interesting, after 20 more mins. a waiter (not our waitress) brought the huachinango (garlic fish), a few minutes later comes the waitress and apologizes. Well then, a few mins later we get the appetizers, yes we got one main entrée before we got the appetizers.
Oh, Oh but wait that’s not it. so we waited a little longer for the for the other 2 entrees to arrive. I’m thinking relax, there she comes, there she comes. Everything should be fine now. Just relax and enjoy the meal with your friends.
She gets to the table and places one, yes one, pina rellena on the table. So we asked her about the second stuffed pineapple and she tells us that she placed the order for only one pina rellena and that it would take 20 more mins to get the second one.
We just looked at each other, stood up, and walked out of the restaurant. And if it was kind of rude to do that, there only so much bad service I can take.
BTW, the food is not even good (my humble opinion) the actual seafood is over seasoned, and the side dishes are bland.
This is not the cheapest seafood place in the city. For the money you pay you expect more than what you get.
El Veneno. Bad food, worse service.

Okay, so my family owns a vacation home in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico. This particular city is right next door to the state of Nayarit, which is FAMOUS for it’s style of cooking seafood. Seriously, I literally want to cry everytime I get a craving for seafood from Puerto Vallarta and I’m stuck in Chicago.
Mariscos El Veneno is my answer to these cravings! No other restaurant does ceviche like they do! And I love it because it’s literally their bread and butter! You get a tosada of ceviche as soon as you sit down.
They also bring out all their fresh fish so you can pick which one you want BEFORE you eat! You also have to try their «Veneno» salsa, which is means «venom» in spanish. It’s lethal, but tasty.
You also can’t beat a place that brings your a bucket of ice for your beer, no charge and has free entertainment on the weekends!
The only complaint I have is that the street parking SUCKS. Other than that, El Veneno is one of my favorite places to eat when I’m channeling my inner seafood lover!