Pollo Tropical

Pollo Tropical is located right by Bedrock city comics, and is relatively easy to get to off Westheimer. We went late in the evening because we were hungry, and there wasn’t much open. I wasn’t sure they were still open, despite posted hours, because it took a good few minutes for someone to come to the drive through box and ask us what we wanted.
I got the ¼ chicken with yellow rice and red beans, my boyfriend got the classic chicken sandwich and a side of plantains.
The chicken was decent for being the last half hour of open business and probably not being super fresh. I actually quite enjoyed the yellow rice, but mostly just because I like rice and vegetables, and that’s not too hard to get right. Beans were average to completely unnecessary to me.
Chicken sandwich was pretty good, and the plantains were a hit with my boyfriend. I found them a little too over sweet and carmelized to the point of being almost unpalatable.
The biggest hit with me was probably the cilantro sauce and the guava bar. The pineapple rum sauce was meh, and the guava barbeque was nothing to write home about. I love cilantro though, so for me, that sauce was perfect. The guava bar was marked «Saturday» and it was Wednesday, so I don’t know if that was hold until sticker, or a made on that day sticker, so interpret that as you will for freshness. The guava bar was basic, but good texture and just sweet enough to satisfy a sweet tooth.
Overall, the food was decent for a late night excursion, but nothing I would go out of my way to do again anytime soon.

I love the food here. It is decently priced. However, they seem to have made one priticuler employee the whipping boy. He would have one person yell at him to do one thing. In the middle of him doing it, he would be yelled at to do another thing. Straight up yelling! I saw someone yell at him to deliver food. When he was five feet away, someone would yell at him again. I can’t imagine treating anyone that way, but when the manager joined in, I lost all respect for this establishment. No matter what, your employees come first. Treat them right, they will treat your guest right. I will never come back to this location, and it may be a while before I try another location.

Too slow at the drive thru. Wait to place order, wait to long to get order. And that’s how they roll. No sense of urgency at all

I doubt this place will be around long. I really tried to give it a chance multiple times but the food has never been good and the last time I came they were out of macaroni and cheese more than three hours before they even close. The only thing I even semi like on the menu and they never even offered to make more. I’ll take my money to the various superior food establishments surrounding this place.

It was just alright. I feel that 3 stars is being nice. Just like Daniel mentioned in his review, the menu varies by location. There was some sort of spinach chicken wrap that sounded good, but they didn’t have it. The guy at the register wasn’t sure if they made it. After asking two or three different employees, he came to the conclusion that they didn’t have it. Apparently it’s at the locations in Florida… anyway I opted for the chicken quesadilla wrap with fries. I also got the Tropical Breeze refresca. The drink was good, but it was so small (it looked like an 8 oz cup for $ 2). I drank it so fast and could have used another one.
The quesadilla wrap was pretty good. They have a salsa bar (I use this term loosely). The cilanto ranch dressing is good! I also had the guava bbq sauce which tasted like regular bbq sauce to me. I’m not sure if it was labeled wrong. It was good, but it just tasted ordinary.
My food came out before my friend’s. She insisted that I go ahead and start eating. She ordered a salad and figured it would be out soon. Well I finished my entire meal and she still hadn’t received her salad. Come to find out they ran out of chicken and were cooking more. I don’t know how you run out of cooked chicken when you have Pollo in your business name, especially during the dinner rush on a Sunday evening. Anyway my friend said the chicken was good, but the salad was just meh. The lettuce wasn’t that great… which is unfortunate since it was a salad! She had a coupon though so at least she didn’t have to pay full price.
They have a drive thru which is different. But I don’t know that I would come back here unless I just didn’t have many other dining options. There’s definitely room for improvement.

We went at 9:30 on a Friday night and waited 10 minutes at the drive thru window until someone finally asked us to give them a minute. Once we were able to order we were told that it would be 30 minutes wait for half a chicken and 10 minutes wait for wings. We decided to get the beef and plantains which weren’t very good. We were asking if there would be a wait on those items and they didn’t understand our question. It was very frustrating and I will never go back to this location. The locations in Pearland and Westheimer in West Oaks are so much better!

Why would the sign say combo comes with 1 regular sides, cup of soup or tropical favorites, but when you order a tropical favorite and they charge you extra. Service is slow and rude. Don’t come here people. We were so hungry and thought we can get to go pretty fast but it took over 20 mins to get out to go food.

OK, first let me say, to some of you writing your reviews, watch your grammar and punctuation! Jeez, if you are going to take the time to write a review, read back through it and correct some of the run on sentences and whatever thoughts you were trying to convey in the sentence you were trying to construct. That being said, here is my review of PT.
First, I am partially guilty of being disappointed with PT mainly because I was expecting something along the lines of Pollo Loco, which clearly it copies some of the grilled chicken aspects of their menu, but, that is where the menu stops being the menu at PT. VS. PL. I will agree the food I tried wasn’t half bad for fast food service, so I will give the other reviewers that one. The young black girl that waited on me at the counter was very patient going over the menu selections, since I had been craving some avocado tacos, or an avocado chicken quesadilla (on PL’s menu), when I was informed by the manager passing by they don’t do avocados, and a Chicken Wrap with chipotle was about as close as I was going to get to a quesadilla, so I said ‘OK,’ let’s go with that. The young girl at the counter running the register, told me then that I could get one side order with the Chicken Wrap, and also that rice and beans count as one. I told her the yellow rice and black beans will be fine, She gave me my drink cup and rang me up, smiling all the while. I will admit maybe PT has read some of the reviews here, about rude service, and have made changes, As far as I was noticed both her and the Manager were nice, instructing me about what they have and what they don’t on their menu.
I no sooner got my drink filled and a young guy was bringing out my tray and following me to the table. And yes, he came back twice to ask if I was doing OK, and cleanup what I had finished. So, IMHO, service was AOK by me.
One afterthought I will mention is the fact, that the young black girl waiting on me at the counter, showed me the rotisserie chicken revolving behind the glass, and I guess I should have tried the three meat combo or the half chicken instead of the chicken wrap, and here’s where the two stars come into play. Chicken bought commercially in bulk doesn’t cost that much, and although it was flavorful inside the wrap with the chipotle sauce, there were only a few pieces in there, Dang, you get a bigger piece of chicken on a single bun at Chik Fil A, and for a cheaper price than this ‘combo’ meal I purchased at PT. PT, use Chik Fil A as a yardstick for portion control and chop up that portion to put inside the Chicken Wrap. Were it not for the black beans and rice, I would have come away hungry from their ‘Combo Meal’. I was almost tempted to drive down Hwy 6 to Pollo Loco in Sugar Land and order the two Avocado Chicken Tacos, or the Avocado Chicken Quesadilla, but I didn’t.
Maybe I will give them another try, some other day, but, more than likely, I will be headed to Pollo Loco, because they DO have avocado slices on their salads, tacos, quesadillas, and other menu items.

La comida esta muy rica, y el precio muy comodo, solo que el servicio de los que atienden no es muy bueno, (sugerencia)y si es cosina latina deberían tener personas que hablen español también, gracias!

Horrible service and food. Last week i took my daughter and the workers wouldn’t allow us to dine in because only the drive through cash register worked so I was ask to walk up to the drive through window.
Why not run everything through the drive thru cash register?

Pretty glad this place opened up! Chicken, beef, shrimp… great flavors and always fresh. They have a lot of healthy options as well, straight off the grill. Salad and brown rice for a healthy alternative. They have a light menu on top of that, but the portions are super small on those– so not a good idea if you are really hungry. They have a pretty large selection of sides too… and mmmm the plantains!!! SO good you def have to try! I always get the boneless chicken breast with side of brown rice and black beans. Chicken is real big and juicy!
Place is always clean and the staff is usually pretty since and attentive. The prices are pretty generous for dishes.
They have a sauce bar, with some unique flavors. Nice sized patio and a drive through. Def try this place!

Decided to try this place since it’s close to my lash studio and I’m an hour early for my appointment. My bowl is straight up watery because of the beans… I mean if chipotle drains their black beans before putting it in their bowls, I’m pretty sure this place can too. I asked for brown rice and I got white. That didn’t bother me as much as the watery beans in my rice bowl though… Don’t know if I care to try this place again.

I have been watching this being built and have wanted to see try it out since Mad Money host Jim Cramer has been talking about their stock (parent company owns them and Taca Cabana, which I am a fan of).
I was a litle confused on what to get and was standing there for a bit. A staff member came up and helped guide me on what to get. I ended up with the Tropichop with chicken, black beans, corn, and tomato. The staff memeber as wella as the other ones were very helpful and nice.
I was happy they have Coke Zero (always an extra plus in my book), but when I got my drink the soda tasted very weak like the bib of Coke Zero was empty (bag in box with the syrup). I went back and let it run for a second to check. No they just have it calibrated very poorly to get more drinks out at a cheaper price. It basically tasted like mostly soda water.
When they dropped of my food, it looked a little blah and very mushy. They did give you silverware (big plug), bu the bowl was kind of cheap plastic (looked like you would not want to carry it without the tray. I am glad I forgot to get the sauce because it was very mushy. It was blah, not a ton of flavor.
I saw the 2−½ Unilocal stars, but wanted to give it a try since I was thinking about buying their stock. I will pass on coming back and buying their stock.

Not a place i would crave but i would come back, i would ask for dark chicken in the future, they gave me a white breast — not a fan
Yellow rice was not overpowering with flavor, cooked with some bell peppers x onions, properly cooked, corn is just corn, black beans was too soupy, was thinking more of a dry version, mac & cheese was good
The salsa /​sauces added great flavor to the chicken, must check those out
Girls taking order was terrible, they would take my order, and continue back and forth with another customer on the side, had me thinking if they wanted to take my order or not…

This Pollo Tropical needs to get it together. I understand restaurants sometimes have issues when they first open, but it’s been over 2 months. I shouldn’t still be seeing the issues I’m seeing now.
On separate occasions at different times of the day, I’ve come to this Pollo Tropical and they’ve been out of white rice, and out of *gasp* chicken! How can a chicken place be out of chicken 3 hours before closing on a random Tuesday? «No tenemos pollo» is something you should never hear at Pollo Tropical. For shame!
When they do have chicken (and rice), this is your typical «fancy» Pollo Tropical. Food on actual dishes instead of paper plates, real silverware instead of plastic, and bringing the food out to your table. It’s not run as well as the one in Pearland, but the food is consistent. I stick with the quarter (or half) chicken white meat, white rice & black beans. They rice & beans aren’t as good as the ones in Miami, but they’re good enough. The plantains and fried yucca are ok. Stay away from the desserts. I really hope they turn this location around though.

Pollo Tropical («PT») fits neatly in the burgeoning «slightly-​upscale fast casual» market alongside your Pei Wei (be still my heart), Chipotle, Shake Shack, and Pollo Campero chains. PT is intended to be a cut above the Taco Bell drive-​thru at 2am, but it is not aiming to bump off Capital Grille as your #blingy night out on the town. PT should be your «I don’t want to cook/can’t cook tonight, and I can’t stop at Luna Pizzeria for the 10^th time this calendar year because we’re already on a first name basis there so I better try somewhere new» place. Yes, that was oddly specific wasn’t it but they have already caught on at Luna that Diego is not my twin brother but actually me in a flannel shirt and sensible glasses.
I am giving PT one star since I am not coming back here. But I am going to temper the one star with this: they have a drive-​thru so at least you don’t need to get out of your car. They have that one and only advantage over a Chipotle. So I am not going to #savage them so bad they wish they were never born; just enough so that they think about their life, think about their choices.
This has a Unilocal average of 2.5 stars taken from 46 reviews. I read all of the reviews before coming here. There are a lot of shills pulling up the star rating of course. It should be 1 star flat, if only normies rated this place. This is not good food if you needed a tl/​dr.
After browsing Unilocal reviews online I went to their website to figure out my order. What I wanted was the shrimp quesadilla wrap which clearly is on their online menu. This is because Taco Cabana removed their shrimp tampico quesadilla from their menu because they are cowering in fear at the revenge the sea might wrought upon the land for devouring the kraken’s misbegotten children. And I needed a suitable substitute for shrimp in a lazy, fast casual kind of environment. So I drove an hour from my house to get this item. What did I find out? This location of PT does not have this item. CUSSES. Y’all are literally the WORST. You have two cussin’ stars on the item on your online item. Two stars means «limited time offer» while one star means «available in some markets.» Y’all are filthy liars, learn how to count your stars. I have given you some erudite instruction here by giving you a ONE STAR rating on the Unilocal dot com.
Hey, I tried to ask the pretty girl to the dance — but she wasn’t even on the menu here. So your review is stuck with the other girl that showed up to the dance smelling like cheese and talking about nothing but horses all night.
Since I was already there I went with Plan B. The tropichops. I went with the calypso beef, the yellow rice with vegetables, all of the fixin’ vegetables, and the pineapple rum sauce. Their online menu had the right number of stars here that shrimp was available in some markets (not here) so there was no miscommunication about my being stuck with the horse girl at the dance, the calypso beef.
One review described this as hospital cafeteria food. Which is so generous. Hon, you are a saint and can write my obituary. If a Chipotle tried to give you this, even the slightest hint of a complaint would get you free burritos for a month. Because they stand behind what they do. This slop is essentially prison grade food that prisoners would start a riot over if they were served this. I largely think PT corporate just doesn’t give a heck about things like this. I imagine tycoon types counting their money and guffawing that they sold a bill of goods to some suckers. #merica
The beef is so bland, the beans are heavily salted and salt notwithstanding entirely flavorless, the sauce is cussin’ gross (see next paragraph), and the vegetables are thrown in there solely to hide the fact of how little calypso beef there is. If a bruh won the lottery, the percentage of the tropichops that is beef is this guy’s «give to charity portion» which is about 1% at best. But hey, you get all that weird consistency and surprisingly awful red pepper — how hooked up are you!!! It’s bland, it’s salty, it’s terrible in three complaints or less. And there’s more!
Louis C.K. had a bit about the consistency of the «hot syrup» they use at Cinnabon. It had a certain consistency that he described in an amusingly profane way. That’s the exact same consistency the pineapple rum sauce has. Being smart about sauces, I tried a little dip out of the tiny plastic container and even that minuscule amount made me have to figure out where to spit. This is one of the worst sauces and/​or substances I have ever had in my mouth. And I was in a frat in college. Literally, unless you are filming torture porn in your basement skip the sauce. It is that vile.
I would not recommend this place in good conscience to any human unless you are someone I hated in high school, in which case yes, this place is absolutely lovely and will hook you up extra good!!!
Now where is my mouthwash and six tins of Altoids

This place deserves better ratings. Get the «3 meat combo and 2 sides»! The food is really good and plentiful. But they are new, just opened, so they are still getting organized. Give them a break! Actually I found their service to be very good. The wait was caused by people not knowing what to order. There were plenty of registers open and they helped me order. They bring your food out. And for a fast food joint, the waitstaff came by twice to ask me if I needed anything and then came to take my plates. That’s good service!
The 3 meats I got was beef, chicken, and pork. The pork and beef were incredibly tender! They have a lot of dipping sauces which you should try ALL of them. The chicken is a drum stick and breast. It’s alot of food! The skin and meat on the chicken had alot of flavor.
I definitely recommend this place.

My first time here, so I went mainstream. I ordered the chicken, white rice, black beans, and sampled the sauce bar.
They have a fast food look and low prices. But they have a hostess and wait-​staff, but why? When you come in, the hostess gives you your table card/​number. Okay, seems silly. Whatever. I’m sure soon enough they will optimize and drop these unnecessary things.
The menu is pleasantly simple. Would you like roasted chicken, pulled pork, or grilled beef? Choose a side, or two, and have a seat.
The food was slow coming. It was pretty tasty overall. Nothing spectacular, but as good, maybe a little better, than expected. The sauces made it even better. Spicy curry and a pineapple-​rum sauce as I recall. Both tasty.
I will come here again. It’s a nice alternative and a good fit in the area. I look forward to trying the beef and pork. Recommended.

The decoration is what brought me in. The grilled chicken sounds healthy. And the price are reasonable.
But when I walked in, i was greeted by a sour-​faced cashier. The guy was looking the other direction while taking my order. He couldnt be more obvious that he was not interested in being here.
I ordered the ¼ chicken meal. It’s under $ 6, not bad. The chicken was okay, nothing special. I can go down to Kroger and get the same tasting grilled chicken.

I’ve been hearing earfuls from Patrick about how pollo tropical is so good back in Florida. We finally get to try it today, which is grand opening.
We went through drive through, we got tropichops, I got the lite version. Comes with tomatoes, sautéed onions, brown rice, chopped up chicken cubes, and lettuce. The regular tropichops has much more including beans and corn.
I definitely understand its new and takes time to get in order. When going through the drive through, we requested the garlic cilantro sauce. Which was BOMB! I love that stuff.
Staff should smile a bit more, the lady at the register closed windows and opened them quickly, I felt she came off a little rude like she was having a bad day, whatever it is please smile more!
The meal is not bad, healthy, definitely dip your chicken on the garlic cilantro sauce though! Or try the other ones! =]

I was not sure what to expect since I never visited this restaurant when I was in Miami recently, but it seemed along the lines of a Caribbean themed taco cabana.
The seating is a little confusing, right when you walk in the door. There is a hostess that gives you a number, but she takes it to your table while you walk to the register to order. Locating the table with your number on it is a little challenging on a busy day. Servers come and bring out your order and occasionally come around to check on you like a waitress, but not really.
My friend and I ordered a ½ chicken meal with balsamic tomatoes, a calypso beef with white rice/​black beans, an order of sweet plantains, and a double shot tropical breeze rum punch.
I sampled some of the chicken and found it tasty, but some of the pieces were pretty small. The dark meat didn’t need to be dipped in any of the sauces located at the sauce bar. The white meat was a little dry and needed some type of sauce.
The beef dish seemed to be pieces of Caribbean seasoned pot roast, but there was gristle in some pieces and the meat seemed to be pumped with added juices.
The best sauces for me were the fresh salsa and the curry sauce. For heat, make sure to grab a bottle of the salsa picante. I was not a fan of the pineapple rum sauce, since the pineapples seemed to taste like they were from a can.
When ordered at the counter, the cashier said you can either have a single or double shot rum punch for the $ 3.50 price. I asked for a double of course. After I got to my table and had drinken the 1^st punch, i noticed they charged me $ 5.00. I notified a server and they brought me out another for free to make up for their mistake. I didn’t really like the tropical breeze flavor though. For $ 1.99, you can add a 151 floater. They use Bacardi for their rum, fyi.
Although the flavor is a little bit different than what im used to, im not sure I will be back anytime soon.