Fernando’s Tequila Bar & Restaurant

This is my favorite Mexican place ever. I have had so many tacos all around town (and everywhere it seems) and nothing seems to beat theirs. Great service, awesome sides, awesome tacos! I love Fernandos!
I have not had their margaritas but I have heard that they are STRRROONNNG

Unimpressed. These guys have the same owners as Blue Agave — both just as disappointing. Our (canned) queso came out cold, we let the waiter know and he ended up microwaving it. PS microwaved queso = hot milky goo. My tacos came out luke warm. Overall, not worth coming here, id rather eat at taco bell.

I will NEVER step foot in this establishment again. Yes, food and drinks are great. I cannot deny that. It is the fact I have never gained less respect for a business owner as the manager, or owner, of the place as I did this evening. We came here on the beloved cinco de Mayo, because Fernando’s used to hold a special place in our hearts. BUT, after tonight when my spouse was called a whore and slut and more and I merely stepped into the sight of the offender. He proceeded to attempt to choke me out, while several staff members held my arms back. I chose to not act out against the staff at all, because they are simply doing there jobs. My true problem is with the spineless, gutter rat of an owner that actually stood up for the offender which instigated the entire situation to the authorities after that rodent called the police. What is even better is that there was another couple with a woman who was also a victim of the offender. That woman attempted to go back inside the business to bring the altercation further. I grabbed her, held her outside the business and kept her from raising the stakes. The owner and others actually recorded this entire action on THEIR phones. Then, once the police arrived, the owner proceeded to tell the officers that I was the one who instigated the entire situation, even though he had evidence on his phone telling otherwise. If I could bring this business down without affecting the other people who work there, it already would have happened. Please consider this, thank you.

Wow! I read on Unilocal that this restaurant has excellent chicken soup. We decided to give it a try and it was absolutely amazing. The margaritas were great. The atmosphere was fantastic. The furnishings were all from Mexico.

More bang for your buck! Place was awesome! Margaritas were strong, music was lively, live mariachis, people dancing, eating, drinking, partying and having a great time! Worth every dime!
Food was amazing. Once again, if you want a great time & a strong drink (house margarita) check this place out. Worth every dollar.
Those were the ups… my only down was the fact they didn’t honor my check in discount (10%), was a bit disappointed since I spent a pretty dollar but kept a positive attitude towards their service and their employees. I will be back… could probably use better sound.

I always pass this place on the way home & have wanted to check it out for awhile. So I finally did. I called for carryout. I ordered the Veggie enchiladas & the Poblano stuffed chicken. It was ready when I walked in. Great, right? About seven minutes from when I called to when I walked in. I have no problem waiting for good food. It takes a little longer than that to make something decent. Chicken was dry as hell, granted it was a breast. But this was obviously pre-​made. The cilantro pesto helped ever so slightly. The veggies in the enchiladas were well cooked, not overdone. But that’s it, they needed more cheese & maybe some salt. I won’t be back.

Awful place!!! I ordered online and after 30 mins they still had no idea what I ordered. Find another place to order food!

Busy happy hour with complimentary chips and salsa that are yum yum yum!!! I love the hustle and bustle of folks coming in and out — the bar is lively but you can still have a conversation with your party.
Great drinks and fun time!

Drinks are gross, food was ok. When we said we didn’t like our drink they refused to take it off because ‘too much was drank’ which was a total of 2 sips (one from each of us). We asked for the manager who wouldn’t come talk to us.

What happened?
The kids’ menu is gone and the service last night ran from indifferent to surly, when my mother-​in-​law had the gall to be in the bathroom when our server finally got around to taking our order. We were repeatedly asked if they could clear our not-​yet-​empty plates, including once while my fork was in transit to an only half-​eaten tamale. Seriously? I should have known things had changed when we were treated like interlopers at the hostess stand. Having the host field delivery orders probably never works, but a nod of acknowledgement for our existence might have helped, as she turned her back to us while she stayed on the phone.
I understand somebody having a bad night, but this felt like a top-​to-​bottom shift. The whole experience left me puzzled and disappointed.
I’ve been coming to Fernando’s since it opened — margaritas in my 20s, and the last 10 years with my kid. The loyalty built up over years of friendly service and good food won’t survive much of this. If this were my first visit, I would have given one star.

Keep in mind I visited on a Friday during Lent (read: no meat). I was VERY impressed with the guacamole trio. Woweeee, so good! The bacon (pushed aside, sadly) guac with pineapple and I think mango was the favorite. The second was a more traditional take with the usual herbs and spices (but still very well done). The third was a love child between guacamole and Mexican street corn. No actual corn in the mix, but it had the mayo and spices. It was good, but the least favorite of the three. Definitely more than what two people could eat. The chips are good and the house salsa is spicy. I also had a strawberry daiquiri which totally hit the spot. Fajitias, tacos, etc. all smelled and looked amazing, so I’ll have to try those when I visit again. Really fun décor, casual atmosphere. More kids than we expected at 9:00 pm on a Friday night, but they all disappeared by the time we left. Wasn’t a bad thing, but something to keep in mind if you’re intention is a romantic date night.

I have a love/​hate relationship with this place, but I’ve been here well over 10 times so it must be more love than hate
The best part– MARGARITAS. They definitely are strong enough and worth your money (which I usually don’t feel is the case at a lot of other restaurants). I always get two on the rocks and feel pretty good by the time I leave.
The food is good but not amazing. I usually get the poblano stuffed chicken with a side of rice and beans. I also really appreciate their complimentary salsa.
My biggest issue with this place comes with the inconsistency in service. I once was here with a friend for two and a half hours and it wasn’t even that busy. It wasn’t a big issue for us because we were catching up with no where to be, but I could definitely see how that could be frustrating. Out of all the times I’ve been here that’s only happened once or twice but that’s enough for me to recommend not coming here if you are in any kind of hurry (just in case)

Made a reservation on Unilocal and Fernando’s wasn’t open. Unilocal or the restaurant should really update this restaurants status to closed and stop taking reservations.

We stumbled across Fernando’s as the closest Mexican Restaurant to our new place. We soon discovered this would become one of our favorite places to eat! The salsa is SO good! Guacamole is delicious as well. We have tried the Guac Trio, and both agree the straight guac is the way to go! I always get the Shrimp Fajitas, my boyfriend, Tres Amigos Tacos with Steak and Rice and Beans. After his few margaritas, and my beer, we leave happy and too full. Keeps us coming back week after week!

Many TVs and play a variety of games. we stopped in to watch the Cubs and got a table during the playoffs on a Saturday night. They had $ 10 buckets which again was a steal on a weekend night.
Their food was good as well. Great crowd with a regulars feel, but new comers were welcome.

First this place looks extremely fabulous, but all the tables and chairs are very close together, now I’m a fat person along with a lot of other Americans. So why would they place tAbles so close together !!!
I was with three other people, I had the molcajete con barbacoa, elote and poblano rice … That deserves 5 stars. The molcajete was very spicy, my nose was running ! But it had a lot of flavor and enough to take left overs home. The margaritas are definitely from a bulk gallon or an already made mix, which is ok I guess, I requested more limes .
Now, the waitress hair screamed I don’t care about my job, it was in a pony tail on the side ! Just like all the other reviews, the service here takes forever, to get a check and to cash out, when we were all done eating and putting our food in the to go containers (she didn’t help) our waitress was folding napkins and silver wear …
The bathrooms also need remolding and a good cleaning, someone left toilet paper all over the seat and it smelled in there, like urine and sewer, makes me wonder how the kitchen looks. Yuck

I live really close to this place and have walked by many many times, and always though it was closed so it was a surprise when someone recommended it to us, saying they had it the weekend before. We came here on a Sunday, and although the place was not crowded there was a good number of people sitting at the large bar as well as tables. The place is actually very spacious, composed of two rooms. The waitress was very friendly and the margarita and sangria were delicious. We also enjoyed plenty of their chips and salsa. I ordered the fajita buritto rojo with pork, my friend got the same thing only with beef, and my bf got the tres enchiladas. The portions were massive and the food actually pretty good. I thought the pork in my burrito was very tender and juicy but overly salty. I ended up eating only half since it was that filling. So, some may be wondering why I gave this place only 2 stars. Shortly after coming here, my bf experience horrible food poisoning. About 5 hours after him, I felt very sick as well. We both had stomach pains and threw up and I do not think it was possible that we got food poisoning from anything else considering we only eat a homemade salad 7 hours prior to our meal here.

So I’m being rather generous with the 4 stars. I would say Fernandos is a solid 3.5 stars so I’ll round up. We had a really nice server. Really liked the guy. The margaritas were fine… nothing spectacular. The guacamole was good… could’ve used a bit more lime, but no complaints. I just doctored it up myself. I had the shrimp molcajete which was SUPER spicy, but also VERY tasty. My sweetie had a steak burrito. Generous amount of tender steak… and it was probably one of the biggest I’ve ever seen (that’s what she said!).
Solid place with solid food. No complaints… other than it taking 15 minutes to get our check. Since we weren’t in a hurry it was no biggie.
After rereading what I wrote it sounds like a 3 star experience so I should be fair and give it what it deserves, so 3 stars it is!

My friend Jean and I wanted a good Mexican restaurant that had a liquor license for an early Saturday evening dinner. Neither of us had been to Fernando’s before, so we decided to try it out.
First impression of the place — favorable. The décor was great. It looked like someone had recently redecorated the place, because it was beautiful. You enter past a bar area with many side tables to get to the hostess stand. The hostess was welcoming, and, although the restaurant was busy, she quickly guided us to a table in the large main dining room. Within 60 seconds of sitting down, we had waters, silverware, a basket of taco chips, and salsa.
That was the best of our experience. That’s why Fernando’s gets a second star, instead of just one, from me. Everything afterwards was lousy.
I am not sure how long we sat, waiting for a menu, a drink menu, or any attention from a waiter. We watched several waiters walk quickly past us. Jean said, they’re pretty slow with the service here, aren’t they? I took out my cellphone and looked at the time. I said, if we go another five minutes without any attention, we’re out of here. Jean agreed. That was 7:00pm.
About two minutes later a waitress stopped by. She asked, what would you like? I said, do you have a drink menu? No, they don’t. That’s a failure. I really had wanted to order something like a patron tequila margarita, upgrade a little from the standard. Since we apparently didn’t have that option, we ordered margaritas with ice, salt on the rim. We did get them eventually –maybe 10 minutes later? — during which time we watched two people get seated at the table next to us, place their orders and get drinks served before we got ours. I noticed that the woman had a reddish-​colored drink. Apparently they serve other alcoholic beverages than the standard margarita, but we weren’t offered any kind of choice, or told about other drink options. Not one word, printed or spoken.
On her next pass by, before the drinks came, the waitress dropped off menus. We decided we’d better order when the drinks arrived, because who knew when we’d see our server again? BTW, the margaritas were good. We ordered vegetarian enchiladas — mine with salsa verde, Jean’s with mole sauce. We both ordered the same sides — black beans, and steamed vegetables.
I kind of lose track how long it took to get the meals, but it didn’t seem like a long time. When they were delivered by a runner, they both had mole sauce. I sent mine back for the correct salsa verde.
The enchiladas were pretty standard and boring. Nothing you can’t get at another hundred places in Chicago. We both liked the black beans; they had nice spice. The steamed vegetables were not cooked and were barely warm. Seriously not cooked — I mean, raw. They were inedible.
When the food arrived, we asked the runner to relay the message — one more margarita, please. That came in a decent amount of time. We split that between the two of us.
By the time we finished eating, the crowd had really thinned out. Kind of odd to see a sit-​down Mexican restaurant on the north side of Chicago ¾ empty by 8:00pm on a Saturday night. If you’re determined to visit Fernando’s after reading my review, come later on Saturday rather than earlier.
For poor service, an order filled incorrectly, uncooked vegetables, and decent margaritas, we had a $ 60.00 plus bill. We were actually shocked. The vegetarian enchiladas were $ 12.95 each. Without a menu listing the beverages, we didn’t know what we were charged for the margaritas, and we sure as hell weren’t informed by the staff.
Summary: one of the worst meal experiences we’ve encountered. It takes a lot to make us wish we’d gone to Garcia’s in Lincoln Square instead, but Fernando’s managed to do it. Never, ever again. I recommend you go to Los Nopales in Lincoln Square, which is BYOB, and enjoy excellent food and service. Yeah, you’ll have to bring your own booze, but at least you know what you’re getting, and you have all the choice in the world.

I hadn’t been here in awhile because the margaritas had gone downhill, but I live closer now and missed some of the food and staff. I didn’t even recognize the place at first! They’ve added some rustic wood to the windows and the inside has been completely remodeled. I hope they bring back the old taxidermy donkey!
They’ve also revamped the menu and there are some awesome new items, like street tacos and sopes. I wish they still had Chicken Chitzen Itza! Maybe they can make it upon request. The staff is still awesome and I’m excited to try the rest of the new menu.