Serranos - Munich

Serranos - Rosenheimerstr. 66, 81669 Munich, Germany

Promoted as Southern Californian & Mexican food. Dinner only, not open for lunch.
Ambience: Van Halen party-time decor. Half-empty, quiet.
Music: 80's rock.
The menu at Serranos reads excellent. It's got everything listed that all other Munich Mexican restaurants have, plus more (tamales, anyone?). The dishes are described under two categories, Californian and Mexican foods. Californian means cheesburgers, jalapeno poppers, wings & chicken dishes; and Mexican means what you'd expect: quesadillas, fajitas, burritos, tamales, chimichangas, etc. For drinks, there's Paulaner as the local brew, Anheuser-Busch and Miller for imported beer, and a large bar for cocktails. ...


Serranos. Photo by Bob

Wednesday is California Tag - meaning all entrees from that side of the menu are 8 euro. Thursday is the same, but for the Mexican entrees. Wednesday is also Happy Hour tag.

For €28 I got chips & salsa, a quesidilla, a marguerita, and a beef burrito with side of baked potato for the entree.

Impressions:

Happy Hour Tag may not be such a good idea. Sat down with guest at 7:30PM, and 15 minutes later, the guy in the table next to us had to be carried out the door, because he was too drunk to walk anymore. There's nothing that kills a romantic dinner so quickly as having to move aside to let the drunk pass by.

There were two employees working. A combination bartender/waiter and the owner/cook/waiter (yes, he did all three jobs - we asked). Naturally, we expected our food to take some time to arrive - and it did.

Chips and salsa were typical Mexican Munich: doritos, and very sweet. Yuck. It is not difficult to make fresh chips - some enterprising Mexican restaurant entreprenuer should clue in that first impressions mean a lot.

Quesidilla was delicious. Fresh cheese, not Monterey Jack, but very good.

The carne asada burrito was billed on the menu as a Vaca burrito. Uh-oh...

...but it was quite good anyway; and especially was enormous. Fresh vegetables, nicely done beef (rare to medium rare)... and did I mention enormous? This was similar in style and taste to a "Mexican" burrito you can get at a better family restaurant in the States. Street-style it was not (e.g. a B-52 carne asada loaded with fresh lettuce, beans and jack cheese from a takeaway in the western U.S. - you simply won't find here); but for a sit-down place - not too shabby. Served with a side of baked potato, and sour cream from a tub.

I would love to have tried the pollo tamales, but he was out of the necessaries. If anyone reviews them, speak up - I could support a decent tamale shop single-handedly.

Serranos seemed a bit empty, as it's rather large. Maybe twenty people, all 20-somethings in age. Nice location near the Rosenheimerstr. S-bahn station.

Overall rating: B-

Serranos Bar & Grill
089 / 48954959
Rosenheimerstr. 66, Haidhausen
S-Bahn Rosenheimerplatz