El Chorlito Mexican Restaurant

Or call (805) 927-3872 for more information.

• Alba
  Apr 14, 2022
  Great for dogs yes but food mediocre

  I don’t know why people rave about the food. It is not good food. the patio is great for dogs but the food is no bueno. Drive a bit further down to Cambria with plenty of dog friendly options and better food!

• Kimberly
  Jul 4, 2019
  Loved It!

  Had a lovely dinner here on the nice garden patio with our dogs. Everyone loved the food and had plenty for the next day.

• Fred
  Jun 18, 2018
  Fine Food, Friendly to Pets

  There are stunning shrimp quesadillas at El Chorlito (the best I have had), and many other dishes there are very flavorful. And, just as important to me, my dog was treated very, very well in the patio, where many pets were welcomed.
  I have been to the restaurant a few times, and all guests, two-legged and four-legged, have always been treated warmly.
  Looking at the negative review I read on your site, I concluded that the mention of a migraine indicated some other issues and agenda with the reviewer.
  I will return to El Chorlito whenever I am in the area. With my dog.

• Steve S
  More than a year ago
  El Chorlito is Dog Friendly (Outside, Only)

  I wish to share the following complaint about this restaurant, which we visited on October 19, 2015. In March of 2016, we decided to submit a formal complaint to the California Department of Fair Employment and Housing after we were unable to make successful contact with the restaurant's owner. Our complaint was then dismissed after the restaurant declined to accept arbitration of the complaint, because, as I later found out from an attorney, we did not specifically ask for inside seating, after we were involuntarily given an outside table.

  Although I cannot find fault with the food, the overall treatment that we received at this restaurant was, in my opinion, terrible. The letter below was taken from an email that I composed on October 19, 2015, the evening we returned to Santa Maria from our terrible experience at this venue:

  "This afternoon, we drove seventy-five miles up the coast from the hotel were we usually stay in Santa Maria. We decided to stop at a Mexican restaurant, El Chorlito, in San Simeon, about ten minutes away from Hearst Castle. We arrived there about 5:45 PM.

  When we walked into the restaurant with both Daisy and Montera [our service dogs], there were people sitting both inside and outside. Jeannie had put on her coat, because she felt cold. I asked her if she wanted to sit inside or outside, and Jeannie replied that she wanted to eat inside. When the server came over to seat us, however, we were not given a choice, and he put us at an outside table. I suggested to Jeannie that we ask to be moved into an inside table, but she did not want to create any problems and therefore we accepted the outside table.

  During the time that we were eating our meal, the sun set, and it became colder and colder. Daisy began to fuss, as she usually does when she knows that Jeannie is going to have a migraine headache I decided that we should go inside and have a cup of coffee. When the server took us in, he put us at a segregated table in a separate room, I asked him why he didn't put us in the regular dining room. He told us that it was because he did not want our dogs to bother the other customers. When I explained that both were service dogs, he insisted that did not matter.

  We finished our coffee, and while Jeannie took the the dogs to the car, I told the server I wanted to speak with the General Manager. I was told that the GM was not in, and he was the acting manager tonight.

  When I told him about my concerns and about the fact that I felt we were being discriminated against because of our service dogs, he became surly, insisting that the restaurant's policy was legal and that they did not discriminate against service dogs. When I asked him why we were not asked whether we wanted inside or outside seating, he insisted that the policy was that all pets and service animals were only offered outside seating, and if we wanted otherwise, we should have let him know when we arrived. When I further asked him if it was standard practice to ask newly arriving customers without service dogs if they wanted inside our outside seating, he admitted that it was.

  The bottom line is that Jeannie's migraine got so bad that, when we arrived at Hearst Castle, she decided that we needed to go home. When I explained the situation, the Hearst Castle ticket agent refunded the cost of our tickets; but we still end up by paying for an extra night for the hotel, the meals that we consumed, and the cost of travel from Santa Maria to Hearst Castle."
  

We dug up 2 pictures of dogs at El Chorlito Mexican Restaurant.

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