CHiMiCHANGA

Not disappointing, but not remarkable either.
Food is decent and the selection is good, but it’s nothing to write home about. Service is slow but friendly. I like their food but wouldn’t necessarily take guests here.
That’s really all I can say about this place.

We decided to go to Chimichanga for dinner last night. We have been to the Wimbledon branch many times and really enjoyed it. From the very start we could see they were short staffed and that the massive rush of people was going to cause a delay but we weren’t in a rush and decided to stay. We ordered some cocktails and they were pretty poorly made, mine was way too strong while my partners was very bland. Seeing as it took 25 minutes to get the first round of drinks we ordered a second and they were a lot better. We both ordered enchiladas with different fillings and they were pretty boring. Mine were slightly cold in the middle but I carried on. Overall the food wasn’t great, but the staff were friendly and they tried their hardest.

Good food! Good service! Would definitely go again.

Service: 3 stars for effort. There was one gal doing all the beverages and trying to get people seated while another lone waitress covered the entire restaurant during a busy-​ish evening shift. I felt bad for them. Service was a bit slow, but I couldn’t place that fault on the staff themselves. They were trying their best!
Food: 3 stars for taste, 2 for expectations and 2 for price.
I had a chimichanga. I love chimichangas and I figured as this place is named after the dish that they’d likely know how to make one. Not so. Barely crisped up (was it actually fried? If I’m going to splurge on a deep fried treat, I really want it to come through). My steak chimichanga had 2 pieces of steak in it and otherwise just a lot of undercooked bell peppers and onions. It tasted fine, but it wasn’t what was described or what was expected. And it was not at allllll worth 12 pounds.
For claiming to be Tex-​Mex, this place is just another in a long string of British Mexican or Tex-​Mex places claiming one thing and delivering another. Let’s be honest: burritos, fajitas, and chimichangas are all variations on a theme. So if that’s the only Mexicanish thing you’ve got to offer, then I’m not going to be anywhere close to impressed.

One of the many new eateries outside of Southside Shopping Centre, Chimichanga seemed like a good place to try out before our Thursday evening movie at Cineworld Wandsworth.
The menu is Tex-​Mex, with nothing really standing out as different from any other Tex-​Mex in the country, if I’m honest. They were serving paella, which is different I guess, insofar as it’s Spanish…
First thing that hit us was how understaffed they were. The 1 drinks waitress and 1 server were doing their best to seat, take orders, deliver meals, and settle bills — there was nothing they could have done better. But the restaurant should surely have had more people on a popular cinema night? We thought we easily had time for a drink and food, but we ran over the 45-​minute mark, 10 minutes of which were eating.
The food itself was ok. Well, I quite enjoyed it — I had some jalapeño poppers which were interestingly served in a chilli-​tomato sauce (the only «different» thing on display all evening), followed by one of the «specials»; an open Mexican steak sandwich. They were both tasty enough, just nothing special compared to anywhere else in the world. The reason I say «ok» is that it was somewhat overpriced. Had I paid 7 or 8 pounds for my sandwich, I may have felt more satisfied with my choice. As it was, all non-​veggie mains pretty much started at the £10 mark; this sandwich was nearly £11. If you’re going to charge that for ONLY a sandwich (fries, salad is all extra on the side), it better be really, REALLY good — but it was merely decent. Otherwise, serve with a handful of fries or tortilla chips or just something to give a bit more value for money.
So being honest, this was nothing special. If you replaced all the Chiquitos (another overpriced chain of Tex-​Mex) in London with Chimichangas, I don’t think anyone would notice.

This place is ultra-​local for me so I thought I’d give it a try on a quiet post-​Christmas/​NYE Saturday evening. I like Mexican food. I like cocktails. I like the idea of a churro sundae very much.
Unfortunately the idea in this case was far better than the execution. Especially when I got to the churro sundae.
My quesadilla was seriously lacking in Mexican spice, my Mexican rice was seriously lacking in beans, and the burrito was seriously lacking in size. The churros in the sundae were a little under-​fried and had retained way too much of the oil they were under-​fried in, causing my sundae to emulsify into a thickshake with churro chunks.
It wasn’t terrible, but it wasn’t really very good either. It was quite busy though and there’s always the possibility that I made bad food choices, but I’ll probably go back to one of my old favourites next time I’m craving Mexican food.