Travis - Taco Tour stop #66 - The Hill Bar & Grill - 4800 E Douglas

Hey it's me, Travis. Remember me? We used to write about good (and bad) tacos here in Wichita.  I know, I know - it's been a minute.  It's not entirely my fault though. Chris has a different job now and he has very limited time for lunch - so getting 3 guys together for supper is a pain.  Anyway, we did finally make a new stop this week at The Hill Bar & Grill.  But that's because we tried to go to El Corral and they were closed.  I'm not sure why they were closed because their sign really made no sense... So we went to the closest stop we could find, which ironically was actually on our list of places to try. So way back when, someone must have actually told us to check The Hill out.

Chris and I were seated fairly quickly and waited on Shon to arrive.  This was a Thursday night so it wasn't busy - but service didn't seem to be speedy either.  This wasn't great because I had limited time to be there.  Chris tried to order a Mtn Dew but they don't have it - even though they're a Pepsi place (#confused). Looking over their menu I could tell we weren't going to be happy about the value.  You could either order 3 tacos of one kind for $10 or you could mix and match for $13 - so that's a $3 upcharge ($1/taco) just to get a variety of tacos.  Those plates did come with a bean salsa and mexican rice on the side (more on those later).

Order placed for the mix & match with carne asada, carnitas, and chicken tacos. Then we waited...and waited... for quite awhile... 20 minutes pass and still no food.  Finally the food did arrive and it was almost 25 minutes after we ordered.  At first glance, nothing too impressive but lots of toppings.

I went for the Chicken first.  It had plenty of toppings on it and actually had a lot of flavor with a good kick.  The chicken was tender, not overly dry but not really moist either. I did think this taco was acceptable, but the flavor came from the toppings, not really from the meat.

Next I tried the carne asada - meh. Really wasn't anything special at all. I wouldn't say it's bad, but it's not really "good" either. It's just there.  It had plenty of kick and lots of toppings also.  It wasn't warm - maybe room temp at best and slightly chewy. Again, not much flavor in the actual meat.

Last and least was the carnitas. I like carnitas tacos a lot of places - this won't be one of them. It wasn't warm and the carnitas was lacking any real flavor in the meat also. I taste the salsa and everything else on it - including the very strong onions. I wanted to taste the actual meat but couldn't. Again, good kick to it, but that's about it.  Disappointing.

Additionally, the bean salsa was okay but not enough to wow me back into a happy place. The rice was sticky and kind of dry.  So the entire plate was pretty disappointing - especially since it was $16 (with tip) for 3 mediocre and small tacos, the sides, and water.  And I left still hungry (and having to rush).

Overall, I left pretty dissatisfied with The Hill. I've heard people talk about liking it - but maybe they didn't get tacos. Service, while polite, was slow.  I skimmed the rest of the menu and there are other things I'd be willing to try - but I just can't see coming back here anytime soon. And definitely only if I have plenty of time to just sit.

Out of 5 tacos, here are may ratings:

Food Taste:
Value:
Cleanliness:
Service:
Overall:
Likelihood to return: