Sal Y Pimienta Kitchen

I went to today for lunch with 3 other people. We ordered from the lunch menu. We are liked our food and were taking care of by the wait staff just fine. Cuatro Leches cake was one of the best «leches» cakes I have ever had. Ever.

Just went to this restaurant for dinner last week with our employees and I must start off by saying it has a great ambiance and absolutely WONDERFUL service!
For appetizers we ordered a few salads — my mango salad was DIVINE! One of the best I’ve had and alongside the salads my husband ordered the ceviche — both orders came out perfectly and everyone enjoyed.
Btwn all the bread, appetizers and the wine we decided to order 3 cuts of meat btwn 5 people… The meat selection was quite large and they’re very knowledable. All 3 cuts ordered were generally liked.
I ordered the ravioli… the sauce was amazing and the filling tasted good. Although the ravioli felt quite empty leaving it kind of feeling doughy to me. Had it been filled up a bit better it would’ve been perfect, I love fresh pasta.
Generally this place was good and I’m looking forward to coming back!

1. Overall ambiance was romantic — great place for date night!
2. Really delicious crab claw appetizer!!! The butter sauce is so worth it.
3. Seriously, get the «Russ Salad» — it’s their potato salad side (came with our meal), sooo delicious.
4. Vast selection of meats and the server was extremely knowledgeable about each cut. We got the giant platter that had a mixture of sausage, chicken, blood sausage and beef (to try everything) and it was soooo much food for two people. [Chicken was a bit dry but everything else was good.]
5. They offer potato chips and chimichurri sauce as the «bread» — don’t get too full off of this like we did.
6. Be careful though, the servers really [I mean, really] try to upsell you on their wine.

I was hungry for breakfast on a Sunday at 2 p.m. and stumble upon Sal Y Pimienta for brunch. It was a great brunch. The menu had an interesting flair to the brunch time slot. They have $ 12 botttomless mimosas and bloody mary’s. I had a bloody mary and it hit the spot. It wasn’t the best in Houston, but it was good. It has a great sidewalk seating as well as a beautiful interior with great service. I will go back especially since the menu was creative.

I really wanted to like this restaurant after reading all of the great reviews.
The appetizers were good as well as the cocktails but all of the meat entrees really lacked flavor. They all tasted like giant hunks of meat. No seasoning and no flavor at all.
To top it off they forgot to pack more than half of our leftovers. No maduros, no wild buffalo and half the meat was missing from our takeout container. We tried to call the restaurant right away and no one answered since it was past 1am. We then emailed and the owner responded and said he would be starting an investigation but never bother to follow up.
Disappointing service and food.

Food was delightful! Perfect taste for each dish that we ordered. Though it took a while, Im happy to spend our special day here.

We celebrated our 3^rd yr anniversary here. It’s a cozy, trendy and social restaurant that is conveniently located by the Movie Studio Grill and the parking lot. We started off with Trapiche Red Cabernet, King Crab appetizer and the empanada. The wine was wonderful, one of the best cab’s I’ve ever had. I worried that the appetizers were going to be rather «tiny» in proportions because they look that way in pictures but really, the king crab appetizer came with maybe 10 or 12 delicious claws and a one crab cake in the center. The empanadas, although you only get 2, were a tad bit bigger than a large egg and were really tasteful. I liked the cream corn over the spinach. The appetizers were surprisingly quite fulfilling.
We had the Brouchette of Seafood and the El Corderito. I thought the seafood and the lamb was very good. The brouchette had salmon, shrimp, mushroom, and I think scallop. It was enjoyable. The lamb, in medium rare, was great with the wine. We had no room for dessert.
It’s a great place to come have dinner every now and then.
Total bill was about $ 127.00.

The food was okay the server was a bit slow expected to have the menu even though one party is absent! Even when the party arrive still took about 15 minutes to get the menu o guess the server was waiting for the last person drink to come out! We ordered the 4 course meal appetizer was okay the potatoe soup was good not so thick more on the silky side. The steak was okay not as I expected to be great!

Amazing entrees every time. Been here a 2 – 3 times and always leave happy & full :).
The service is excellent!
The staff is highly knowledgeable of their menu & wines and fast/​happy to make suggestions. Ive had some appetizers & liked them all. And the entrees never fail to impress. Top: brochette of seafood– amazing & plump! For dessert go w/​the crème brûlée over the casseta helada. Will definitely be back to try more!

Had a late lunch with my husband 8 yr old son and sister n law. We had the chicken empanadas to start, mango salad which we all shared and they were very accommodating even though they did not have a kids menu they offered to make him a pizza! So he got a pizza that was way too big but he enjoyed it. All of our food was delicious. We had the pollo a la palta (grill chicken on a avocado mousse,)the short rib tortellini and the, silpancho. Very tasty. The host (not sure if it was the manager) of the evening was actually the one taking our order. The waiter seemed a little lost and just disappeared. I asked him for lemon 3 times and he would smile And say (ah yes!) and still forgot. I had a wonderful cucumber margarita cocktail I can’t even remember what it was called but very refreshing and yummy. I would of liked better service from our waiter as it seemed he just forgot about us. But everyone else was very helpful and service was fast.

If I could I would rate this place with 3 and a half stars. I came here with a party for HRW but again i ended up ordering off the regular menu.
We had the fried plantain chips and chimichurri to start off with. They were really good however we only had two for our table of 14 and they were pretty slow at refilling it. The lamb appetizer and the tuna tartare were really good but I didn’t really like the salmon carpaccio and prime pork lollichop. The salon carpaccio was just some thinly sliced salon with a bunch of vegetables on it that I didn’t feel like matched in taste and the pork lollichop was dry. The ceviche off the HRW menu though was a very large portion and pretty good.
For our entrée we ordered the «2 person» Parrilla which was a 72 dollar huge platter of different grilled meats. I don’t know the size of the two ppl this was intended to feed but in my opinion it should be split with 3 or 4 people. My favorites of this were the lambchop, the beef rib and the incredibly moist chicken. I usually am really hesitant to eat chicken because I just prefer red meat more and I refuse to eat dry chicken but this chicken was so so moist. The roasted corn it came with was really good as well.
We didn’t order any dessert for ourselves because we were so stuffed but we had bites of other people’s desserts and I wasn’t that impressed. They were all a little too sweet for me and nothing special.

Came here for the executive lunch with my department and was impressed with the food and the service of this place. First off, $ 22 for 3 course meal? What a steal. And I’m talking about actual 3 courses (I’m sorry but house salad isn’t count as one course). Our company reserved the private room in the back and pre-​ordered our choices of the executive lunch.
Service and staff are great! Love the atmosphere here. Parking can be tough in city center but it’s not the restaurant’s fault.
My favorite part of this place is their food options for the lunch menu. My three courses were:
Empanadas (beef and spinach) — ⁴⁄₅: the spinach one is my favorite. Love the subtle curry taste. The beef one was a bit dry. Still good but I would settle for two spinach next time
Puntas de Tenderloin– (⁴⁄₅) def tastes better than it looks. The sauce/​topping it came with just elevated the whole dish. The meat was of course very tender.
Crème brulé (⁵⁄₅) — yummy!!! Not too sweet and just full of goodness.
Definitely would come back here for lunch again

Came without a reservation and were told that all the tables were reserved. We almost walked out and went somewhere else, but the manager must have really wanted our business because right after we walked out he came and told us that someone had just cancelled. We ended up staying and having a nice meal. The one thing I was not aware of is that many of the meats in Argentinian cuisine are spiced but there is no sauce, so being used to putting hot sauce on everything in Texas, this was a bit weird. I had the butterflied pork tenderloin and it was well seasoned and the potatoes were very good. The waitstaff was very attentive and knowledgeable, which I greatly appreciate. Contrary to other reviewers, I don’t think the service was slow. Yes it did take a while for us to get our food, that is understandable given the quality of the meats that are prepared to order.

This place is pretty tasty. We were actually planning on going to a different Argentinian restaurant but due to timing issues, we decided to try this place. None of us were disappointed. Everyone was very happy with their selection.
I ordered the pasta (Argentina has a heavy European influence on it’s food) and it was great. The pasta is handmade which you can definitely tell. The meat selection is large and the staff is very knowledgeable about it. I was impressed with how helpful our waiter was.
The kitchen is out in the open, so you can see them cooking your food. Not only is this kinda cool in general, but you know that they aren’t doing anything gross or weird behind the scene.

I was walking across this place one day and saw this restaurant. It’s kind of hidden, but it is located next to The Tasting Room!
They had a poster with big, bold font saying «Executive Lunch Menu $ 22», so my friend and I went in after a bit of shopping in City Centre. You get an appetizer, entrée, and dessert… Don’t pass on it! The lunch menu was fantastic, lots of choices for entrees. I think there were 13 to choose from. There were probably about 5 selections for appetizers and 6 for dessert.
They give you complimentary house made chips and corn bread (?) with chimichurri. The chips were too salty in my opinion. Didn’t eat much of this. I didn’t try the bread either. It looked like corn bread but not sure exactly what.
We both ordered Empanadas Argentina for our starters. You can pick 2 from Beef, Chicken, Ham & Cheese, Spinach, and Cream Corn. We both ended up with Spinach (⁴⁄₅) and Cream Corn (⁴⁄₅). They were delicious with the green sauce it came with. I believe it was creamy pesto sauce. Delicious. I highly recommend the cream corn empanada, but they were both great. If you order two different kinds of empanadas, you’ll notice a distinct pattern between the two.
For entrees:
My friend ordered Puntas de Tenderloin. It comes with beef tenderloin tips served with tempura mushrooms and basmatic rice. She finished her plate clean.
I ordered the Veal Marsala (³⁄₅): Veal scallopini in a Marsala wine reduction served with mashed potatoes. I wished they gave more sauce or something because once I finished the sauce, I couldn’t eat the mashed potatoes or veal alone. Veal was more on the salty side, and plain, dry mashed potatoes doesn’t cut it for me. There was a tomato that I ate with the veal once that made the meal taste better. Point is, something was lacking. I ended up taking half of the veal home and added some sauce concoction for dinner. Otherwise, nothing memorable from this entrée.
For dessert:
We ordered Flan (³⁄₅) and Ensalada de Frutas (⁴⁄₅). It was my first time trying flan. I enjoyed it more alone than eating it with the dulce de leche it was sitting on. Flan was the perfect level of sweet for me. My friend liked it too. Ensalada de Frutas, fresh fruit! It was served with orange juice with fruits in a martini glass. Both had good presentation.
Their wine menu was decent. We asked for a wine pairing, but our waiter didn’t know and recommended white wine. We ended up with an Uruguayan wine, which was too sweet in my opinion.
Overall, okay service. They got more slow at the end. I would recommend this place for their 3 course lunch due to the variety.

My new favorite place in Houston. Sure, the prices are high, the parking sucks, and the ‘new urbanist/​Agenda 21′ high density minimall (with parking meters on its private lanes) that surrounds Sal Y Pimienta is all very, very craptastic. But there is, of course, valet parking nearby (at a price — but this IS the ‘burbs of Houston y’all). Forget the obnoxiousness of Sal’s environs and give the restaurant the chance it deserves.
But the food. Oh the food. I don’t normally rave about grilled chicken — but Sal’s wood burning grill is hot enough to sear in the juice and give it some flava. The Caprese salad was almost as beautiful as something the Adria boys might have served at elbulli in Spain — a beautifully composed creation of the freshest ingredients. The chef/​owner is in the kitchen and makes sure that the food that comes out is top notch. I’ll definitely be back to try some steak soon. Highest recommendation.

I had high hopes for this place and it really wasn’t anything too great. There are small South American cuisine restaurants that are less expensive, less pop but the food is better. The experience is worthwhile.
We came without reservations and was told we can only sit at the bar. Turns out that’s the beat seat in the house. The restaurant features an open kitchen so when you sit at the bar, you look directly into the kitchen. And I don’t mean, looking through a glass, it’s completely open. This was the best part. You were able to see the line cooks plating the food, the chefs cooking, the host who was also expediting the food. It is a small kitchen and small restaurant so you can see it all. If you ever watched Too Chef Restaurant Wars, it felt like a love version of that with less chaos of course. It was fantastic!
The service was hella slow. They seated us immediately. We got water and chips and chimichurri quickly. But we had no menus. It took them a good solid 15 minutes to get menus. Then it took another 15 – 20 minutes to take our order for the drinks. Then another 15 minutes to take our order for our food. It’s very slow service. They were trying their best because it was packed but they need to find a better system.
We had the pisco punch and caipimorango drinks. The pisco punch was very good. The other was okay.
For starters we order the veal tongue. It had way too much vinegar that the fish was sour like a jarhead candy. I wish they didn shower the veal tongue in the dressing. It took away from the flavor of the tongue.
For our meal we had the parillada that comes with a bunch of meat and sausage. We asked to replace the chicken breast with the cut of picanha. The meat was okay. I was really disappointed by the cut if picanha It’s not what I’m used to. I asked and they said they cut it like a New York strip to take most of the fat off. In Brazilian restaurants, the picanha has a lovely fat border. The parillada came with a pepper stuffed with an egg. It looked overcooked on top but it was completely raw. It was all liquid under the layer of overcooked egg.
I took the tres leches to go. It was okay. Churrascos has the better tres leches.

We had our 2^nd visit to this restaurant today. We just really like this place. Our server is super great and recommended some great wines for us to try. Service is excellent and food is tasty (you have to like meat). I’m so glad we found this restaurant.
Ask for Victor. He is great both times we’ve been here.

Can’t go wrong with the «Executive Lunch» at this place. $ 22 includes three course meal including app., entrée and dessert. Limited app selection but wide range of entrees from steak, chicken and fish with a South American theme. Excellent portions and every dish I have had was on point. Desserts are perfect size and nice variety flan, tres leches, etc… Good food for the value. The service and food are top notch.
Next time I go I going for the tomahawk cut steak. Seeing that large humongous piece of meat made me think of Fred Flintstone driving with the rack of ribs in the trunk of his ride. Does anybody memba that???

Perhaps my taste buds were not enough to give this place five stars, but for some reason I kept thinking if this place is «Sal y Pimienta», where exactly is the salt and pepper in their food?
I was very underwhelmed with their calamari. It was so small and the crispness they I look forward to was not there. The squid was also very chewy. I didn’t finish it, so they should tell you something. There were empanadas ordered by our party, and they were eaten quickly and had good reviews, so they may be worth going back for.
My entrée, otherwise simply known as the seafood kebab with creamy pesto sauce, was okay in texture and how it was prepared, but again just lacking in seasoning. The steaks that were ordered by my party were a little on the tough side, and again, in my opinion, lacking SALT and PEPPER.
The desserts, on the other hand, were the exact opposite, very sweet, and border-​line over powering for those that are not dulce de leche lovers. But for those that are, you will be in for a treat. Order the dulce de leche crepes. They were a great balance and it was a nice close to our meal.
Will I come back? Of course. There were way too many other things in the menu that were worth trying but I couldn’t eat everything at once. So in short, don’t order the calamari, bring salt and pepper, and get the dulce de leche crepes!