Tasty food at Pollo Tropical, but…

Pollo Tropical

We tried out Pollo Tropical last time we were in Florida and we loved it. It was like the Caribbean version of El Pollo Loco, which I already love on a regular basis. But Pollo Tropical offers so much more than simply chicken — they have steak, shrimp, pork, pulled pork, plantains – yum. So when we arrived in Fort Lauderdale and discovered Pollo Tropical was one of the closest restaurants to our hotel – oh yes. I convinced Trin that we needed grab food there for a late dinner.

The meal pictured above was mine — a steak and shrimp combo with black beans, rice and balsalmic tomatoes. Looks pretty good, right? Now check this out:

Pollo Tropical

This is what I could’ve had. In fact, Trin’s order — chicken, ribs and steak — was almost exactly what I wanted — I had asked for the chicken, ribs and shrimp combo. But they had no more chicken. Ironic, huh — a place named Pollo Tropical, literally Tropical Chicken, but it ran out of chicken. So I asked for what I had last time — the pulled pork meal. Yeah, they were out of that too. Dang! So I ordered the steak and shrimp, and the guy taking orders who had been checking in the back as we offered up our choices to check on what was there finally came back with good news — they had steak and shrimp for me.

As we waited for our order, the guy taking our order kept having to go to the back and check with the chefs…to make sure they weren’t setting aside the chicken for themselves and leaving Trin without his chicken. That’s right. The reason why there was no chicken left for my order was because the women working in the back that night were setting aside the chicken to take home. Sheesh.

The food was good, but the bogarting of the chicken by the workers was inexplicable. I once worked at a food place myself, and we didn’t take any of the pastries home that wasn’t left over at the end of the day. I mean, isn’t that common sense?

So yeah. Good food at Pollo Tropical, but if you get the wrong crew, you might not get your chicken.