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Noche Tapas and Tequila Bar
Rating Details »
- Price Range:
-
$$
- Accepts Credit Cards:
- Yes
- Parking:
- Private Lot
- Attire:
- Casual
- Good for Groups:
- Yes
- Good for Kids:
- No
- Takes Reservations:
- Yes
- Delivery:
- No
- Take-out:
- No
- Waiter Service:
- Yes
- Wheelchair Accessible:
- Yes
- Outdoor Seating:
- Yes
- Good for:
- Dinner
- Alcohol:
- Full Bar
14 reviews for Noche Tapas and Tequila Bar
I'll start by saying I liked this Noche. If you have been around the Vinings area for at least 3-4 years you would know that this Noche is located in what used to be La Madeleine's. They've done a nice job trying to revamp the space and make it their own but it is a little awkward in some spots like the entrance. The entrance used to be set up in a cafeteria style manner and they did not do a good job utilizing that space; it's still set up like a hall.
I went on a very busy, rainy Friday night. It took about 20-25 mintues to be seated (which I expect at almost any restaurant in Atlanta on a Friday). Our server was pleasant except when he thought my niece was a nephew. To his defense, she was completely covered with a hood, dressed in blue and is only 2 months old. The food was good but some of the tapas portions are piss poor like the crab cakes. The lobster taco (I say taco because they split one tortilla down the middle and put them on top of each other - to me this is one taco not tacos), chicken skewers, and calamari are very good. The salads are nothing spectacular - they are actually kind of skimpy on ingredients if you don't order a wedge. The drinks were decent as well.
Overall, if you are in the Vinings area and like the Here to Serve concepts, it's worth a visit. If you are closer to the Virginia Highlands location...go there. It's got much more character.
So this was my first visit to this particular Noche. I rarely ever venture out of my comfort zone. I had a pleasant experience. Our waiter was nice, nothing over the top, nothing outstanding.
I did try to lobster tacos, which I thought were pretty darn good.
The set up of this place is a little awkward. The hostess stand is way in the back...all through the bar area. Kinda weird and annoying.
all in all, good times. Not sure if I'll be a regular here, but I'll keep it in mind.
Wednesday night in Vinings and I'm entering Noche. With no immediate greet from anyone remotely resembling a host I feel lost. My date speaks up and says to me: we must have entered the side door... where's the hostess stand". Finally a voice speaks up to say hello and welcome us to the restaurant we've already been in for over a minute.
The dining room is crowded with chairs and tables waiting for their guests. Pretty much a ghost town with a lone guitarist and we get sat right beside a table full of loud children. Its Thanksgiving Eve so I'm not shocked by the lack of patrons and not happy to be siting near the kids table.
The menu is scattered with no discernable rhyme or reason to its order. It has misspelled words and an item with no price. That's unacceptable in my eyes.
The food wasn't all that great. $6 for one overcooked bland fish taco. Really? I'm officially no longer a fan of Tapas. Thanks Noche!
Service... Yeah, not so much. We were given dirty menus and weren't greeted for a very long time. It took forever for us to get each plate. Whenever I would ask for anything whether it be a sauce, or another drink it either took forever or never came at all. My Tecate was brought to me with the Lime sticking out of the can. I askedo for a glass and was told they were out.
When a server has cleared your table of all plates, asked you if you want another drink or dessert menu and you say no, what else is there? After we said we didn't want dessert nor another drink she disappeared. Finally I had to give the "nod" to say: "Hey, we're done, why are you not giving us our check??? Can we pay please?? "
In the end... sorry. NO Bueno Noche. I won't be returning. Bad Service, Bad food, Bad Evening... Good bye.
We went on a Friday night and the place was hopping. I really liked the openess and even though it was dark in places enjoyed the overall ambiance. We had the Grilled Marinated Skirt Steak with Tobacco Onions, Crispy Fish Taco With Jalapeño Tarter and Spicy Slaw, Potato Crusted Salmon with Asparagus and Lobster Cream, and Fresh Mozzarella and Tomatoes with Aged Balsamic, Truffle Oil & Pita Bread. Everything was SO GOOD (the steak, taco and salmon were the best out of the four but the tomato mozzarella was still good). The service was good even though the waitress wasn't very friendly. The only thing that was missing was live music. Even though Noche is a little on the pricey side I would definitely return but not when I'm starving or else you could drop some serious bank.
I'm a huge fan of all the Here to Serve restaurant concepts, but this has got to be the worst. Whereas I absolutely adore Noche in VaHi, Noche in Vinings is a bust. First of all, the food at this location is sub par at best. I don't remember what I ordered the first two times I came, but it doesn't matter because I don't eat at this one anymore. The only reason I give this place two stars is because it is still a great place to drink.
$5 house margaritas and $2 Tecates daily....and the patio is nice. I'm a huge fan of deck bars, and that alone redeems anything that the food has done. If you're looking for a good meal, drive on over to Noche in the Highlands. If you're looking for a good drink with some buddies after work, come here.
Mc-what would you Mc-like for Mc-dinner tonight?
Did you say McTapas?!
Looking to leak big bucks out the rear end for some Fancy Feast that rivals the best of the best...in the fast-food chain world? Look no further than here, my dear friends (If Kevin H. were still around, he would think that he had died and gone to heaven...).
This place seems to be THE hot spot for all the people who live for the conspicuous consumption of totally crapadelic food and drinks...oh yeah, and there is some form of an unofficial popularity contest going on too, right? Great! Where do I sign up to be on the ballot for Homecoming Queen??
So yeah, where do I begin?
Let's first talk about the raping of my wallet. Expecting that Monday nights were the (in)famous $10 all you can eat Meow Mix...uh, I mean, tapas, we were hoping to get a good idea of what this place was about...without becoming to fiscally committed on the first shot. Well, they've changed it to $1 taco night.* Fine. We'll make do. At least this let us sample a wider variety of table scraps.
*A word to the wise: Thou shalt not stray from the set list, lest you find yourself paying 10 times what the Friskies is worth...
So we started out with the tacos, of course. Allow me to elaborate:
Chicken: Dry, clumpy, "meat" flavored Kit 'N' Kaboodle with a glob of snot...oh, that's supposed to be guacamole.**
Steak: Under-flavored gristle...and is that supposed to be peppers? One bite and I'm done.
Beef Tongue: Who knew that french-kissing a cow would be the least grotesque thing on the menu?
Fried Fish: Did they just chop up a bunch of Fillet-O-Fish sandwiches and stuff minnow sized strips into a stale tortilla? Sure tasted like it!
Veggie: Canned black beans and corn topped with another lump of the chef's best mucus.**
**Um, seriously...I have NEVER tasted worse guacamole than this one.
Because we must be crazy, we decided to trek off the beaten path and go for some other tapas:
Fried Plantains: Now, I like McDonald's hamburgers, I do...but not when my plantains are flavored like them! That's seriously the first thing I thought of when I bit into one!
Mini Crab Cakes: 2 bite sized McCrab Cake flavored patties of Iams' best seafood pate! The jalapeno tarter sauce serves its purpose as a clever disguise for the canned goodness.
Fresh Mozzarella & Tomato w/ Balsamic & Truffle Oil: Oh, please don't make me relive this nightmare. The "cheese" was completely tasteless! The tomato was just as bad! Complemented by some horrid sauce drizzled over top...if that's what truffle oil tastes like, Lord help us all.
I noticed that they topped it with green frilly stuff...yeah, my dog used to put leaves on his food too, when it was unappealing.
Also disappointing:
Space is cramped.
Tacate is $2 because it comes in a can.
Parking SUCKS if you arrive later than 6:00.
Now, I won't be entirely negative because I must admit that our server was exceptionally nice, and they were very kind in accepting reservations.
The restaurant was nicely decorated. There. I was nice. But I didn't come here to eat the decorations, nor the reservations, nor the server. I came here to eat food...and what they pass off as food does not resemble much worth eating.
My advise to anyone planning to eat there: Don't...unless you prefer to sincerely over-pay for junk that's worse than what you ate in your elementary school cafeteria.
*VOMITROCIOUS*
Some may call me a control freak or maybe even slightly OCD. But, whatever you want to call it, I like order. Period.
I've never eaten tapas. I understood the concept of small plates to share with your fellow diners, but this was my first visit to an actual tapas restaurant. The first thing I noticed after being greeted by the server and ordering our drinks was the lack of order on the menu. This became apparent when the server asked us if we wanted something to start with, "chips and salsa? queso?" I glanced over the menu...turned it over and looked at the back..."where are the starters?" I asked the person next to me. I didn't get it, and I don't want to. Organize your damn menu.
Food wise: I was the lone veggie eating with a bunch of animal eaters so I kinda did my own thing. Fine by me. I ordered the flat bread with the veggies and cilantro pesto to start out and then a bit later got the spinach salad with pecans and southwestern ranch. The flat bread was okay. It had goat cheese, which made it okay. Otherwise, bleh. The salad was not good. I returned it. Bland bland. Maybe my tolerance of spice is much higher, but the said southwestern ranch dressing tasted like mayonnaise. In place of that I ordered the wedge salad without bacon. It was alright, the bleu cheese wasn't the best I've had, but how can you screw up a wedge salad?? The last thing I ordered, since I was still unsatisfied, were the plantains. I love plantains. And for those of you who are unaware of what a plantain is...it's a produce item, a fruit. So explain to me when my plantains had fat lines in them like bacon? I'm a vegetarian. I don't like fat lines.
Service was terrible. After asking if we wanted more drinks and then getting the inevitable dessert questions to which we replied, No!, we proceeded to wait....and wait....and finally I turned to the person next to me (Paul S....he's kinda cool) and asked, "what are we waiting for??" Finally the server came by and, no joke, asked us if we wanted the check. Again, What are we waiting for??
I was glad to finally leave noche paying way more money than anything that I put in my mouth was worth. Figure it out.
Awful.
Got here on a Friday night...it was quite busy...lots of people standing around yet plenty of tables available. We got there and were told the wait was 1.5 hours (I tried to make reservations earlier but they don't take them). So we stood around for 1.5 hours wondering why there were empty tables not being used and sat at the bar and had some drinks. $5 margaritas and sangrias. I know why. Because they are god awful. I took 3 sips of my sangria and decided it wasn't worth finishing. I also had a raspberry mojito which was a little better but still pretty bad.
When we were finally seated, service was extremely slow and poor. The layout of the room was designed so that voices would just bounce off the walls and since the place was filled with tons of women celebrating events the place was so loud my friends and I were practically screaming in order to be heard.
Food was also terrible. The best thing on the menu was the hummus which was really just average hummus. Lobster tacos, mussels, crab cakes, chicken empanadas - all absolutely terrible.
We couldn't wait to get out of this place. Unfortunately it took us half an hour from the time we asked for the check to get the hell out because our waitress was so busy and clueless. We saw her running around with our credit cards in her hand for a good 10 mins until we flagged her down and told her they belonged to us. After dinner, we headed over to Cold Stone for some ice cream because the dinner was so unsatisfying.
I'm not a big tapas fan. In fact, I hate tapas places, but this place was okay.
I went on a night where they had $1 tacos. Normally, the tacos cost $4. They had 5 tacos on the list. I ordered all 5 tacos. All those tacos were small. They weren't like "normal" tacos. They were "tapas" sized tacos (they looked like normal sized tacos though). I ate all 5 and was still hungry. Their chicken and steak tacos were my favorite. The others were okay. Their vegetable taco looked good on paper but wasn't my favorite.
We also ordered 3 tapas: "fresh" mozzarella and tomatoes with truffle sauce, crab cakes, and some plantains. The mozzarella didn't taste good, but the truffle sauce made up for it. I didn't care for the crab cakes. The plantains were good, but they had a weird taste.
We were still hungry so we ordered 3 more tacos. Overall, between 2 people we had 8 tacos, a beer, 3 tapas, and 2 sangrias. That kinda shows that 3-4 tapas isn't enough to satisfy a hunger for 2 people. Don't come here when you're hungry. Come here for a snack.
Overall, I liked the experience. If it weren't for the $1 tacos, I would've hated this place because it would not be worth it to come here. But the $1 taco saved this place from getting a 2 star review. I suggest only coming here when they have these type of specials.
Also, they had $2 Tecates. That's pretty cool.
The atmosphere and crowd was trendy and hip. It was actually a cool place to be in. But it did just open. I wonder what it would be like once it becomes stale and yesterday's news. Would it still have the trendy atmosphere?
Like I wrote earlier, I probably wouldn't come here on a normal night. But I had a decent experience.
I went here on opening night and the place was packed. Service was very slow but that's usually to be expected on an opening night. The tapas we tried were all good, but I do not recommend the queso dip. It was pretty bland.
I have one complaint - am I the only one who prefers my margaritas frozen? They are happy to make them this way for you, but the bartender didn't recommend I get it this way as he said it would be watered down. He was absolutely right - although I decided watered down might not be a bad thing.
I like the ambience but it was really crowded and very noisy inside. We moved to the patio which was much better. Well I'm heading back there this evening, so I'll let you know if they've improved in the past 2 weeks! Wish me (or is it them) good luck!
I was kind of dissapointed in this place. I LOVE VA Highlands $10 AYE on mondays. So when Noche came to Vinings, I was stoked.
$1 tacos is a GREAT deal, and contrary to some other reviewers I didn't have such a problem with the taste. To each his own...
However, I eat alone a lot and the servers obviously don't think I spend enough money and the fact that their attitude shows is completely unprofessional and rude. And I will NOT leave a good tip for such attitudes. I usually tip above 20% when I am alone because my check is not usually big, but give me attitude and that won't happen.
Other than that, I don't have a huge problem with this place...I just like the highlands better.
Not a bad place. My friend and I decided to check this place out since it just opened last Friday. This is supposed to be the same restaurant as the one in the Highlands. I have never been to the other one, so don't know how it compares.
We decided to partake in the Monday night special of the 10 dollar all you can eat tapas. Basically, it was a set menu but you could have as much as you wanted. We had a menu of salad, gazpacho, beef quesadilla, cheese quesadilla, bbq salmon, fried chicken, and corn on the cob. The food was good. The major problem was that the portions were so small. It turned out to be a waiting game. We would pop the small portion and then wait for more. The way it was set up was that you would receive only one portion of one item at one time. For example, you would receive an hors d'hoeurve portion size of salad or quesadilla and then wait 5-10 minutes for the next bite sized dish. This was ridiculous even for tapas. I get that tapas is supposed to be small portions but this was not even enough for one person. Everyone else appeared to be having the same problem and you could see everyone getting frustrated. Our server was cool and put in multiple orders at one time so that we could end up with 5 dishes at one time. The one thing that stood out negatively was that the corn on the cob portion was ridiculously small. To drink, I had a mojito which was pretty good.
The service was pretty good. My gripe is with the food policy for that night of putting in one tapas dish order at a time. It became a challenge and we spent 2.5 hours there to be barely satiated. The space looks pretty nice and now that it is summer, eating outside can be pretty nice.
Overall, I'd say if you're looking for a place to hang out and drink, this place is ok, especially with dollar beers on Sundays. If you're looking for dinner, you'll probably be disappointed.
Dirty water and bad service. I'm hoping it was due to the timing that we went, but this was an awful experience.
We arrived to an empty restaurant (more than likely due to just opening) yet we had to wait to be noticed by the hostesses. They seated us at the smallest table yet no one was in the restaurant with plenty of better tables available. We asked for water only to get dirty glasses with water that tasted like it had been ladled from a rusty drain pipe.
The food was not much better. We ordered the spanish fried potatoes (the waitress forgot our dipping sauce), fresh mozzarella and tomato, grilled chicken and vegetable skewers and the bbq pork. The best thing was the mozzarella and tomato. The rest of the items were equivalent to the quality of a chain restaurant which pre makes their entrees and then just heats them up to serve.
The margaritas are equally average, so best to go on a day when they are having one of their drink specials. Otherwise, there are plenty of better places in the area.
We were so shocked at how poor our food was that we felt we need to go back just to give it another try. Yet some of the other reviewers had similiar experiences and now I feel like going back would be punishment.
We were ECSTATIC that a tapas place took over the restaurant space. Within 2 weeks of Noche opening. The meat dishes had really lo-quality beef - off tasting, gristly. I don't get it places like Willy's and Taco Veloz can pull off inexpensive beef dishes with decent beef.
What ever you do stay away from anything fried. The oil they used tastes downright funky: a little rancid, a little fishy. Yet the place was open only 2 weeks - so why the rancid oil taste? I can only guess that they are using really lo-quality oil like the lo-quality beef choice.
For my money I'll still go to Taco Veloz & Willy's for quick cheap bite and Lime Taqueria for well priced with a great vibe.
There is a lot of competition in Vinings. Unless Noche gets their act together they won't be seeing a year anniversary.