Taco Del Mar

My fave taco del mar location is near the airport they get 5 stars as they aren’t chinzy and don’t penny pinch. mililani is ok few times I have been here they measure the spoons or even give less and will actually dump meat and veggies back to make it less. Makes me sad ‚(is it really worth it to charge for cilantro and every little thing and give small amounts of food. If you were a little more generous we would want to come more often. But because you aren’t we limit our visits. Ordered beef enchilada platter and they were the most pitiful I have ever seen. I wanted to laugh it was like a tbsp of ground beef rolled up…

This is an update to my last review for Taco Del Mar Mililani. After a very disappointing visit –previous visits were uneventful yet nothing foodgasmic or crazy special, but fast food never is.
Anyways, immediately after I posted my last review the owner contacted me and took the time to listen to and address my concerns. He did offer to comp my next meal, however, I wanted to give them another try without the fear of them spitting in my food or doing anything special so that the review could be unbiased.
I do like the system of Taco del Mar; I grew up in San Francisco so I’m used to the fast and efficient taquerias; many of taquerias on Oahu are EXTREMELY slow and mediocre. The workers today continued to seem hesitant in rolling burritos. Thankfully today I did not see any ripping tacos or exploding burritos. Always a good thing!
Moving onto taste… I ordered a chicken burrito and added on guacamole and sour cream. It wasn’t horrible but again nothing mind blowing. Both the chicken and rice was dry. Since the place was packed and it was lunch time, I’m assuming the food was freshly cooked. Perhaps the holding trays are too hot?
All in all, if you’re craving Mexican food and are short on time, head down to Taco Del Mar.

Reposting, because apparently the review I posted a couple days enough was not detailed enough and was reported.
I went in with the intention of getting a steak burrito with chips and queso. They were out of steak, but no biggie, so I got the chicken instead. My wife got a shredded beef burrito, and we got our kids a cheese quesadilla. No issues with the quesadilla; standard cheese melted in a tortilla. It was obvious while they were making the burritos that they did not know how to properly roll a burrito. For both burritos, the worker made no effort to roll the tortilla around the fillings, instead trying to roll it too small and forcing filling off of the tortilla, getting pico, beans, and all the other filling all over the outside of the burrito once it was wrapped in the foil. In the 2 minutes it took to pay, sit down, and open our burritos, all the liquid on the outside of the tortilla had soaked in, making the burrito fall to pieces when picked up. No napkins or silverware are easily accessible to customers and have to be requested, but when there was no one ordering, all the workers were in the kitchen area and not up front.
I could easily overlook all of this if the food were good. Both burritos were very bland, even though we had pico, cilantro, and salsa added. Their chips and «queso» is an absolute joke. It was obviously the same stale chips and canned nacho cheese you get at a Little League concession stand, which is ridiculous at any Mexican restaurant, even if it is fast food.
I really enjoy places like Moe’s and California Tortilla and was looking forward to a new place to get my burritos. Unfortunately, this place is not it.
Hope that is detailed enough for you.

If I could give this place zero stars, I would. I couldn’t eat my burrito because it was splitting open and falling apart. The food was flavorless. So bland and $ 30 for my family to eat there… the chips and queso were obviously the same nachos that you get from a package and can from the movie theater… ridiculous for a Mexican restaurant to call that chips and queso. We will not be returning.

Pro tip: enhance ur offering with the «by request» items (i.e. Cilantro, fresh lime, reaper salsa)

Says they are open at 10am… We got here at 10:40am… The OPEN sign is not on. A worker comes out and tells us «we are running late, so we will be open in like 30 more minutes» … WOW

Been here a couple times already and absolutely love this place, great food and service. Happy to have these guys in Mililani!!!

I must’ve visited at the wrong time. I went to pick up some food here after I recently was told by the owner that I could order a 5 lb burrito today. I asked about the Cinco De Mayo challenge they were going to have the next day which involves a 5 lb burrito. We communicated via Facebook post on Living808 page.
Maybe there was a misunderstanding, but when I got to Taco Del Mar, one of the workers told me the 5lb burritos were not available until tomorrow. I was a little upset but I did order some other great items and just kept calm and enjoyed the rest of the evening with my family.

The employees are very friendly. I am deaf so sometimes I get a little anxious about how people react and communicate with me. Thank you!

My husband and I were looking to try something new and we came across this Mexican restaurant. The service here was poor, the quantity was a joke. I got the enchilada platter and there was hardly any chicken and not to mention the sauce I had to ask for another scoop. My husband got the taco salad and all the ingredients including the lettuce didn’t make half way of the shell. Last we got our son the kids taco and wow. Now that was an embarrassment! Hardly any chicken for a flower tortilla. I would give this no stars because of the bad quantity on our food and the service was just not good. Save your money and if you’re looking for a nice Mexican restaurant I recommend «El Palenque on Wahiawa» and «Just Tacos» here on Mililani.

The food is always good if not great here. The employees are friendly and professional. There are always good deals going on. This should be one of the top spots in this area to eat at.

Revised rating, the owner promptly contacted me and graciously refunded our purchase price. He apologized and called the manager about the proper way to handle the situation in the future. A++++ for customer service. We will be back to try again. Thanks.
Original Review
Very dissatisfied with food at the Mililani Taco Del Mar! The rice in our Baja bowl and platters had many HARD inedible grains of rice that hurt our teeth and could easily have cracked our fillings. All the manager on duty said was sorry. Terrible. Not coming back.

Good tacos! Ordered two tacos w/​o their meal deal for $ 5.89; used a $ 5 punch card. The guy server did a good job in filling up the taco shells; didn’t skimp.
Tip — eat the tacos quickly if you got the hard shells, as mine did get a little soggy by the time I got home, but it still tasted great! :)

My first experience about a month ago:
I wanted to try this place because I like Mexican food and there aren’t that many options for Mexican in Mililani. The person who helped me didn’t know what she was doing at all. She wasn’t sure if she was supposed to put my food in foil or on a plate or in foil then on a plate. There was no one else in line yet it still took me about 10 minutes to get my food because she clearly needed more training.
My second experience last week:
Even though I did not have a good first experience, I returned because it was a good, convenient option. When I walked in, there were quite a few people inside so I figured that they improved. I was very wrong. The person who helped me this time (not the same person) seemed to know what she was doing, but she talked SO SOFTLY that I could not hear her! I had to keep asking «excuse me?» and she was getting visibly upset (giving me the b-​face). The cashier (who was friendlier) put my salsa into a plastic container, but the salsa got all over the container and she didn’t put the cap on good. She almost put it into my bag but I had to say «I think the cap isn’t on good» which then prompted her to wipe the salsa off and snap the cap on securely. I don’t like that my tacos were only wrapped in foil and were not put in a take out box. When we opened up the foil at home, all of the insides of the tacos had come out already. The pricing doesn’t make sense to me either. You can add rice, beans, and a drink for $ 3.49. OR you can just add rice and beans for $ 1.49. Which means the drink alone costs $ 2? That doesn’t make sense, right? It might even be cheaper to order the rice and beans and the drink separately. On top of all of that, the caps for the soda cups didn’t fit right! I tried 3 different caps and none of them would go on securely.
Anyhow, both times, the place seemed a little messy. The food is just okay, but for the price, I think I’d rather go to Surf N Salsa, El Palenque, or Taqueria El Ranchero, which aren’t that far away. Hopefully this place improves since it is in a very convenient location!

I had previously posted 4 stars, but I have to update it. The service went downhill fast and the quality of the food isn’t what it was just a few weeks ago. The beans and meat were watery, and they were seriously skimping on the meat — so I asked, is that all the meat you give? As she scooped a spoonful of chicken and then tapped the spoon a few times trying, but failing, to drain the water, she knocked off about half of the meat. She reluctantly put a little more meat on and with a sassy attitude said — is that enough?
I ate the burrito but could barely hold onto it because the water in the meat and beans trabformed the tortilla into a sloppy, slippery membrane. Not good.
I hope this place changes their focus on providing quality food and service and stop charging for upgrades like guacamole. The food is already too expensive for what it is. If they don’t turn it around, I can’t see how they will survive.
I will be going to taco bell from now on if I want crappy Mexican fast food, as Taco Del Mar is not much better and more than twice the price.

With the «appealing photos» I saw on Unilocal,I convinced my hubby that we should try this place because it looked pretty good. Took us a while to order because it was our first time. Staff was patient and friendly. (Star kudos only) They made recommendations and we ordered some of the things they praised.
Looks can be very deceiving! The first recommendation was the fish taco. I would not order this again. It was very dry and chocky tasting. I spit my first bite out, opened it up and basically just ate the salsa, guacamole, and sour cream with the «Costco» tortilla chips I got as a meal. The second recommendation they made was the queso cheese with the meal. I again didn’t like it either, to me it wasn’t as good as they said it was. I can see why their nachos would be good because of the guacamole, sour cream, and salsa, but not much from that. My husband ordered a burrito bowl, but didn’t say much about it.
Sorry taco del mar, this was the first and last visit for us based solely on the food review. Keep up the positive customer service!

We’ve been waiting for this to open and finally had our opportunity to try it out and not drive all the way to Kunia or Aiea.
Let’s start with the customer right before us. This guy complained about EVERYTHING. He whined about the portions, whined about the prices, and wanted his toppings layered in a certain order. Look pal, if you want Starbucks go next door.
We figured this guy was just a whiny little man and not their fault obviously.
We ordered 2 tacos, a smothered burrito, and the enchilada plate. The whiny man was SO RIGHT! They’re how my fiancé put it, «Portion Nazis.» They have designated serving spoons for each ingredient yet they still shake the spoons off to serve less than the spoonful. C’mon, a few more grams of costco cheese aren’t going to put you out of business. If I’m going to pay extra for double portions of everything I’ll take my business elsewhere. I hate to say it but… Taco Bell puts more love into their food.
Taqueria El Ranchero is a bit further but the food is authentic and they don’t skimp on anything. I’m sorry I ever gave this place a chance.

They should learn to take phone orders, busy 2 parent, multiple kids playing multiple sports families in Mauka!
My husband kind of liked his burrito, the rest of us had Nachos, tacos, and a baja bowl with the ground beef. It was horrendous!!! We couldn’t finish any of it.
Parking was also terrible because everyone was at The Wing Stop– should’ve took that as a hint

I tried Taco Del Mar for the very first time this location opened it, which is conveniently located across the street from my house. I think we came just a couple days after opening and I got the nachos with ground beef. They were generous for the amount that they gave and I was very satisfied with the quality of food. The chips were warm because they toasted it with cheese on top before putting all of the other toppings on top. Yum!
The second time I came here was just a few nights ago and this time I got the taco salad with chicken. Honestly, I was a little scared to try the chicken because if you look at it, it is just drowning in the sauce that it was cooked in, making it look mushy and soggy. I took the risk and decided to try it since I already got to try the ground beef. I was surprised by the taste of the chicken, it was actually very tasty and not mushy at all when they put it on the salad. It went very well with the guacamole. The only concern I had about the this salad was that the shell was a little stale. I would have like it to be a little more crispy.
Despite that, I will definitely be back to try something new.

Was hoping to enjoy my food here but it was just okay. I ordered the taco salad, the shell wasn’t really crispy, it seemed like it was left out a little to long. They were really skimpy on the amount of stuff they put on there.
The staff was excellent. Great service, I just wish the food was better. For the price you pay they should be s little more generous.