Mexican cuisine dazzles with vibrant flavors and colorful presentations, but not every dish deserves a spot on your plate. While authentic Mexican food offers incredible tastes, some menu items might disappoint your taste buds, wreck your wallet, or even upset your stomach.
Before your next fiesta, arm yourself with this insider knowledge about what to skip when scanning that tempting menu.
1. Nachos Supreme
Soggy chips drowning in a sea of processed cheese product – that’s the sad reality of most restaurant Nachos Supreme. What arrives at your table bears little resemblance to authentic Mexican cuisine.
The mountain of toppings creates a structural nightmare, leaving bottom chips inedibly wet while the measly toppings barely cover the top layer. By the time you’re halfway through, you’re essentially eating a cold, congealed mess.
2. Chimichanga
Holy deep-fried nightmare! The chimichanga represents everything that went wrong when Mexican food crossed the border. This oil-soaked torpedo delivers a gut-bomb of approximately 1,500 calories – nearly your entire day’s worth in one greasy package.
Restaurant versions typically use low-quality fillings masked by excessive cheese and sour cream. The deep-frying process creates an impenetrable shell that traps steam, resulting in mushy tortillas and filling that scorches your mouth on first bite.
3. Fajita Salad In Tortilla Bowls
Fajita salads in those edible tortilla bowls are the ultimate dietary deception. You’re trying to be healthy by ordering a “salad,” but surprise! That crispy bowl alone packs a whopping 400-600 calories before a single vegetable enters the equation.
Restaurants typically fry these bowls in the same oil used for everything else, giving your “healthy choice” unwanted flavor companions. Once dressed with creamy toppings and fatty meats, these salads can easily exceed 1,200 calories.
4. Queso Dip
Fluorescent yellow and suspiciously shelf-stable, most restaurant queso dips have more in common with plastic than actual cheese. The dirty secret? Many establishments use processed cheese food products spiked with industrial emulsifiers to achieve that unnaturally smooth texture.
Real Mexican queso fundido features high-quality melted cheeses like Oaxaca or Chihuahua, not the weird chemical concoction served in American chains. The artificial version leaves a waxy film coating your mouth long after you’ve finished eating.
5. Sizzling Fajitas
Sizzle without substance! That dramatic platter heading your way is 90% theater and 10% overpriced disappointment. The sizzling sound comes from water sprayed onto a superheated plate – not from actual cooking magic happening tableside.
Most kitchens pre-cook the meat hours earlier, then flash-heat it before serving. This results in chewy, often dry protein that’s been sitting around collecting bacteria.
6. Tex-Mex Enchiladas
Buried under a landslide of neon orange cheese product, Tex-Mex enchiladas bear little resemblance to their Mexican ancestors. Authentic enchiladas feature corn tortillas lightly dipped in chile sauce, filled with simple ingredients, and topped with queso fresco – not the cheese avalanche American versions deliver.
Many chain restaurants use pre-made frozen enchiladas reheated in industrial microwaves. The sauce? Often powdered mix with food coloring and MSG for that addictive quality that keeps you coming back.
7. Taco Salad
Calling this calorie bomb a “salad” is like calling a swimming pool a bathtub – technically similar but wildly different in practice. The standard restaurant taco salad delivers approximately 1,400 calories thanks to its deep-fried shell, generous layer of refried beans, heaps of cheese, and globs of sour cream.
That pitiful bed of iceberg lettuce (the nutritional equivalent of crunchy water) doesn’t make this a vegetable dish. Most versions contain less than a cup of actual vegetables despite their massive size.
8. Tableside Guacamole
Watch in amazement as your server performs the world’s most obvious upcharge right before your eyes! Tableside guacamole shows theatrical flair but delivers highway robbery to your bill – often costing $12-18 for what amounts to two avocados worth of dip.
The performance masks a simple truth: there’s nothing special happening here. The ingredients are identical to the kitchen-made version, just assembled with flourish to justify the premium. Restaurants love this trick because avocados are cheap in bulk.
9. Hard-Shell Tacos
Crunch, collapse, catastrophe! The hard-shell taco might be America’s greatest Mexican food fraud. These U-shaped corn coffins weren’t invented in Mexico – they’re a purely American creation designed for convenience, not flavor or authenticity.
Their fatal structural flaw becomes apparent with the first bite, when the brittle shell shatters, depositing half your filling onto your plate (or lap). The pre-formed shells taste stale because they are – most sit in boxes for months before serving.
10. Frozen Margaritas
Brain freeze with a side of insulin shock! The average restaurant frozen margarita contains more sugar than three Snickers bars – around 56 grams per serving. These slushie abominations typically use bottled sour mix instead of fresh lime juice, resulting in a chemical aftertaste that no amount of salt can disguise.
The frozen texture conveniently masks the absence of quality tequila. Most establishments use the cheapest possible spirits for blended drinks, knowing the sugar and ice will hide their harshness.
11. Chile Rellenos
Oil sponges masquerading as vegetables! Restaurant chile rellenos often arrive at your table having absorbed more oil than the Exxon Valdez spilled. The traditional dish features a roasted poblano stuffed with cheese, dipped in egg batter, and fried – but American versions take the frying to criminal levels.
Most kitchens deep-fry these at too low a temperature, causing the batter to soak up oil instead of creating a crisp exterior. The result? A soggy, greasy mess that obscures the pepper’s natural flavor.
12. Combination Platters
Mexican food’s greatest hits, performed by a cover band that can’t play instruments! Combination platters promise variety but deliver mediocrity across the board. These massive plates feature smaller versions of multiple dishes, none executed particularly well.
Kitchens prepare these components in massive batches, often days in advance, sacrificing freshness for efficiency. Order a single, freshly-made specialty instead of this reheated sampler of disappointment.
13. Churros From Chain Restaurants
Those sad, lifeless sticks masquerading as churros at chain restaurants would make any abuela weep with disappointment. The chain restaurant version? Frozen, pre-made cylinders reheated and rolled in cinnamon sugar that’s been sitting out all day.
Many establishments use churro mix containing preservatives and artificial flavors rather than the simple choux-based dough of traditional recipes. The resulting texture resembles stale breadsticks more than proper pastry.
14. Jalapeño Poppers
Spoiler alert: There’s nothing Mexican about jalapeño poppers except the pepper itself! This bar food creation was invented in Texas in the 1970s and bears zero resemblance to anything you’d find in authentic Mexican cuisine.
Most restaurant versions arrive frozen in boxes, then get dumped into deep fryers. The cheese filling typically contains modified food starch and other stabilizers to prevent melting during frying – hardly the quality ingredients Mexican cuisine celebrates.
15. Burrito Bowls
The ultimate restaurant profit machine! Burrito bowls eliminate the tortilla – the cheapest ingredient – while charging the same price or more than a regular burrito. This brilliant marketing trick convinces customers they’re making a healthy choice while maximizing restaurant margins.
The rice base, typically overcooked and sitting in a steam table for hours, absorbs whatever liquid your toppings release, creating a mushy mess by the time you reach the bottom. Order actual tacos instead.