Sur 16 Restaurant

I wanted to love this place! The guac didn’t have much flavor & neither did the salsa! I ordered chicken mole enchiladas and I wanted shrimp tacos but they didn’t have that available so I had to order fish tacos instead. The homemade tortillas were great but the fish tacos were very dry and flavorless. The mole had a very strong aftertaste that I didn’t like at all. The pinto beans however do get 5 stars from me they were delicious! Chips were on the hard side but I loved the seasoning they put on them. I was hoping for a flavor bursting experience but to my surprise all of the food was rather bland.

amazing. the owners are fabulous, the food is delicious, and the atmosphere is so friendly. go here and tip well!!!

I’ve been here twice with my family, and both times we all loved the food as well as the service. The tortilla soup is excellent, and we all loved the yummy chicken tinga tostados. I had a marguerita, and my husband had a mojito — both excellent. Our kids ate rice and beans and quesadillas. We will definitely be back!

We originally plan to dine at Smith. But after discovering a 40 minute wait my partner checked in at Sur16 and said they had an opening. We ordered Margaritas and chips and then waited for 50 minutes for our dinner to arrive. It was only after inquiring with the hostess that it was discovered our dinner order was never placed. No dinner was coming and the restaurant wasn’t even busy, this to me was totally unacceptable. Apologizes came but it was too late for sorry. Our drinks and chips were comped. But we never got a chance to taste the menu. Dinner missed after waiting endlessly. Human error understandable. Will I go there again? Highly unlikely.
Service needs to be more customer sensitive. Too bad we didn’t wait for 40 minutes to enjoy a dinner at Smith. Lesson learned.
I’m sure there is something good at Sur 16 besides the chips and margaritas, unfortunately that did not materialize tonight.
Bummer!

Haven’t been here for months. Menu has grown a lot over that time. We (2 adults and one child) had an excellent meal. My favorite is the corn. Also love their guacamole. Fish tacos in a blue corn tortilla, very tasty. All in all a good experience.

Ambience. A
Service. A
Food. A
Price. A
Cool clean modern with hints of art work and pics depicting Latin America scenes and culture.
Server was very friendly but wished I spoke Spanish so I’d have better communication. We had to repeat back and forth a few times to ensure I understood what he meant or I was ordering. Overall, very nice checking and ensuring I was enjoying meal.
Everything is fresh and housemade with essences if Latin America regional cooking.
Started with the sweet rice water with cinnamon. Made fresh at bar and non alcoholic. Very refreshing and found out as I was eating that it calmed the spiciness while eating.
Ordered the Sur 16 ceviche with shrimp. Very fresh and made to order With fresh onions mangoes and cucumber. A little spicy and great fresh flavors. I wished the shrimp were more tender. Served with house made tortilla fried chips. Nice and crunchy.
I asked for sauces in side and was given and mild pepper and a hot habanero. The habanero really is spicy! Whoosh! Only taste a little at a time.
Chile relleno was delicious! Ordered with octopus and shrimp.
Cooked charred perfectly tender octopus and shrimp with pickled onions. I also found he chile a little spicy as they leave quite a few seeds in the top of stem.
Overall, I loved the freshness and flavors.
I used a Groupon but can’t wait to come back and try tacos. They have happy hour!

Came here for a HH with co-​workers. $ 3.50 glasses of wine! The chips and guac are a must try. We also tried the tostada which was pretty tasty as well. The place was pretty empty when we got there but a few more tables filled up as the night went on.
Our server was so friendly and gave us very generous pours of wine which was nice. I was surprised with the slowness of the service though for being such few people in the restaurant.
Didn’t try anything else on the menu so I can’t speak to having an actual meal.

I’ve popped into this place a few times now, and have had a solid experience each time. Between the fresh, tasty food and the friendly service, Sur 16 is a great new option for Latin flavors on the Hill. I wouldn’t call it Mexican — they describe themselves as ‘Latin American’ and just the term ‘Mexican’ brings to mind oversized Tex-​Mex platters overflowing with melted cheese. This ain’t it, folks.
Somehow, nearly every time I’ve been here, I’ve ended up ordering the guacamole and some sort of tacos. Guacamole is definitely solid, could maybe use a little more lime or spice, but it’s good and chunky and fresh. The chips are delicious, thick and freshly fried and dusted with a blend of spices. The tacos are always delightful, served on a blue corn tortilla that’s extra fun. I’ve tried the fish tacos — nice and mild — and the carnitas and the cochinita. Although they did run out of the carnitas one time (blasphemyyy) both pork options are definitely delicious! The cochinita came piled high with sinfully tender pork, and after the creamy guacamole, crunchy chips and sizable tacos I could only eat two and had to take one to go. And they definitely don’t even look that big.
Protip, though: taste the hot sauce they bring you. I tasted my friend’s, and it wasn’t spicy at all, so I decided to dump mine all over my tacos… well, plot twist, although the sauces looked identical mine was actually habanero and I ended up scraping it off onto my plate and crying throughout half of my meal. Rookie mistake on my part! Don’t do what I did!
The drinks are a little overpriced considering they really aren’t anything special, but it’s 15^th and we all know how bar-​restaurants really make their money… I’ve opted for a cider most times, but once I tried an offering that came in three tall shot glasses — one of tequila, one of lemon juice and one of sangrita. Not quite what I was expecting, so I looked at our server and said «I have no idea what to do with this» and he just smiled and walked away. Challenge accepted. It was a bit of a science experiment but I managed it. I think. I’m sure.

I love this place! It’s tucked away a bit above the street so it’s fairly quiet around lunch time. The food is delicious and their margaritas are very unique (cucumber cilantro, anyone?). I’d say almost all of their food and drinks are a bit on the spicy side so be sure to ask your waiter for milder recommendations if you can’t handle a bit of kick.
Their chips and salsa are SO good. They put chili and other spices on them and now typical Mexican restaurant chips seem bland to me. On that note, don’t head into Sur 16 expecting Mexican food, it most definitely is more Central/​South American inspired. They have some of the standards like tacos and enchiladas but with very different twists. My favorite things on the menu – besides their amazing chips – are the Flautas De Pollo (deep fried tacos) and Ensalada De Nopales (cactus salad).
The restaurant is beautiful too, full of wood and metal and gorgeous artwork. Loved the music too. Definitely one of my new favorite restaurants on Capitol Hill.

Sur 16 is great. It serves fresh food that is thoughtfully prepared. Don’t think «Tex-​Mex,» think South American. No 2,000 calorie cheese ‘n bean bombs here.
Atmosphere is basic; go for the authentic vibe of the food and the service. (and music)
I’ve been there with a group and it was EASY for us to hear each other! Made for a fun, stress-​free dinner.
I’m glad Sur 16 moved in.

This review is for the churros & helado since its the only item I’ve tried so far from this place. For sure they serve a legit Mexican style churro! (trust me I’ve tried my fair share of churros lol) AND they fill their churros with cajeta –bonus points!
The décor and space of the restaurant looks great I’ll have to actually try their food sometime. Staff is very kind as well.

The food here is so good! I haven’t dined in the restaurant, but I had it ordered (with Caviar) a couple times for work — sooo good! Quesadillas are super yummy! Just had the mushroom one. Also got the shrimp and pineapple tacos – so fresh and good! Oh, and do get the corn.
Plus, speaking from an order/​delivery perspective, it was fast and they were very accurate with the order!
Everything was fresh and not too heavy.

Sur 16 is a newish restaurant on the 15^th Ave area of Capitol Hill amongst a cluster of other popular restaurants. Being next to several gastropubs means they have their work cut out for them. I think they are doing a good job so far.
I went here for dinner and got the chile relleno. My hungry companion got ceviche and taquitos. I think the chile relleno was excellent but I would give the ceviche a ³⁄₅. The guacamole was rich but somewhat bland. I was a bit confused by the menu because they have Peruvian and Argentinian food items with some cliché Mexican favorites thrown in.

Ate here last night with a friend of mine. Started with chips, salsa and guacamole. The chips were homemade, thick, and crunchy with a hint of lime. Guacamole and salsa were nothing special. They both tasted like they needed salt and were served right out of the fridge. When they are served too cold you can’t really taste any of the flavors.
For my entrée I had the mole enchiladas which were served room temperature and had no cheese in them. The mole was ok but I wouldn’t order it again. My roommate had a sausage torta which was really good but they left the casing on the sausage and it was really hard to bite through.
The saving grace of this place was the drinks. The margarita was soso but the sangria was delicious. I had two glasses.
I’ll probably be back to give this place another shot but I was not very impressed by the first experience.

Freaking LOVE this place!!!
Their happy hour is to die for!!! $ 6 margheritas, $ 3.5 shots, $ 6 entrees!!! ^-^
Happy hour is from 9pm until close!!! Go! Go now!!!
Only downsides are that their sign is hard to see, making them hard to find and that the place will get loud pretty quickly when there are a few tables taken by slightly drunk people.

Disappointing experience here.
Food was good, however even after making reservations for our party of three, it took over 40 minutes to have our margaritas served and over an hour and a half just to have our entrees. We just sat at our table killing time eating chips. We got complementary shots of tequila on the house when we got the bill and we appreciate the offer, however we would’ve much rather had the chips complementary of the house as we all had to drive right after dinner.
I like to give places second chances and hopefully next time things will be more organized and much more timely the next time we come in.

Found ourselves in Capitol Hill and of course used Unilocal to find a place to eat. Sur 16 was definitely not your usual Mexican fare, I usually hate American Mexican food. But the reviews were very good.
Anyhow staff was extremely polite and eager to help make a decision. The mojitos were fantastic, the food was anything but classic Mexican fare, so don’t show if you want a fat burrito, but with how nice these guys were I am sure they would make it. Well first time eating cooked cactus and not the flavor I was expecting, very good. Overall this place was great and I left not feeling like I ate 2000 calories. Another great place in Capitol Hill. Worth a try!

I’m really tempted to give this place 3 stars because the food was fairly good but everything else was just horrendous. I dragged two coworkers here for lunch a few weeks ago, after having seen the Amazon Local deal and reading the reviews. Seemed like a safe bet. While the food was good as I mentioned, the service was terrible. I really think they’re open for lunch just to see if they’ll get some business, but really, they aren’t set up to serve lunch (at least not yet). First of all, NO ONE ELSE was in the restaurant except for us. You’d think we’d get better service because of it, but quite the opposite. By the time we left, there were only two other tables. As far as we can tell, only two people were working there (the server seemed also to be the cook). We didn’t catch on to that fact until after we ordered.
I chose the stone mortar (malcajete) that had carne asada, cactus, chorizo, and beans. Seemed like an excellent first dish since it had everything! The server (which we later discovered was also the cook) warned that it would take 30 minutes. After consulting with my lunchmates, we decided we could spare the time for the experience and I proceeded with my order. We ordered a side of chips and salsa to start.
During the wait (no other patrons were in the restaurant), the only other staff person there was moving ice VERY LOUDLY from the kitchen to the bar area (which we were sitting right in front of). We literally had to stop talking when he poured the ice bucket because it was so loud that we couldn’t hear each other. He’d pour, we stopped talking, and then when he was done we’d start chatting again. It was cringeworthy each time. The guy didn’t seem to catch on. We figured it would stop soon but after 10 minutes (I’m not even joking), one of us finally stood up and asked him to please stop until we were out of there. He had no clue.
So, 30 minutes for the wait for my dish turned out to actually be more like 50 minutes. I couldn’t believe it. While it was delicious, it was disappointing how off their estimate was, especially during the lunch hour when people have other things to do (like get back to work). There was no acknowledgment whatsoever that her promise fell far short of reality. Things happen, but really you should at least acknowledge it for good will.
On the bright side, their tres leches cake is amazing, the chips were flavorful and authentic, and everything tasted great. I’m wondering if happy hour and dinner service is much better. I still have that Amazon Local voucher and intend to use it for happy hour, so I’ll post an updated review when that happens.

This is a great new Mexican, and Latin-​American, family owned restaurant. It is great to see the owners greeting most of the incoming clients and supervising the kitchen. The atmosphere is really welcoming, LGBT friendly and supportive, and familiar. It truly makes me feel at home.
In the food front, you definitely need to try their Paella, Pupusas (Salvadoran food) and their amazing molcajete (Mexican). About the drinks, definitely try their traditional Paloma, sangria and ask the servers for their specials; they serve an amazing cilantro-​jalapeño margarita that will blow your mind.
This restaurant opened about a month or so ago, and it is great to know they are open for feedback as they continue to improve in all fronts. This is a great addition to the 15^th Ave food scene.

Sur 16, I want to give you another chance to redeem yourself in a few weeks once you work out all the kinks.
My party of 3 was directed to the bar while waiting for a table, which was fine. We then chose to sit at an open table in the bar area (maybe that’s where we went wrong) and then we didn’t get any service at all. We let the hosts know we were interested in ordering food twice and they didn’t send anyone. We tried to give them a chance for 40 minutes to look at us and then gave up.
Walked up to the bar and placed our order. A server dropped my silverware on the way to my table and never brought me back a new set. Had to ask for a chip refill 3 times because we literally had 10 chips/​basket, but that entailed waving somebody down every single time. Overall, we put in a LOT of effort for dinner that night and the place was not full. Very strange experience, ok food, really yummy drinks though. I would come back just for drinks with my girlfriends.