Madera Gastro Cantina - Nashville

This place does not deserve the time it takes to post a review of the dishes and how bad they were. Just know this may be the worst Mexican/Tex Mex I have ever had. I don't care this is a terrible review. They didn't have a problem serving us the frozen salt ridden trash and calling it Mexican food, so why would I feel bad writing this. They need to close the doors, and start over! Stay away!!

I took a co worker to this restaurant for lunch first time for both of us. The service was horrible. We waited a long time to be waited on, and there were hardly any other customers in the restaurant. I ordered the carne asada. It was the toughest piece of meat definitely like shoe leather (about the size of a large flat insole, too). It did have good flavor, and we were pressed for time, so I didn 't send it back but it was almost impossible to chew. My co worder ordered chicken taquitos. They looked like the little rolled up cheapy ones you can buy at the grocery store (24 to a box). We asked repeatedly for sugar for our iced tea, and never got any. We even had to flag someone down for our check. This ain 't happening again for me!

It 's Mexican but not really Mexican. It has a wide variety of Central/South American choices, you can sit inside or out depending on the weather, and you have all the extras of being located at Mariachi Plaza. We ' 've been many times and will keep goiing back.

Sadly, I feel this place has gone downhill. I think they used to be branded as a Latin grill, now they 're calling themselves Tex-Mex . There 's really nothing Tex Mex about it. Dishes like arepas and shrimp and grits are not Tex Mex, there are no frozen margaritas, it 's like they 're confused about what they want to be. I came here for dinner so I can 't speak to the brunch menu but items like maduros Or green plantains were not available. Service was great. Salsa portion with chips was stingy. Very small bowl of guacamole was $9. Good, but very overpriced. I ordered shrimp and grits. They didn 't bring a kids menu so I assume they don 't have one, which means we ordered a $9 plate of wings that my child barely touched. The chipotle shrimp and grits $18) were good and unique, but they were really light on the grits, the cheapest part of the dish? I guess I 'm glad they didn 't skimp on the shrimp but it was unbalanced. Overall, pretty pricey, not really Tex Mex, not really Latin grill, we would have been much happier eating in the food court.

We loved this awesome coffee shop! The owners were super nice and helpful. One of the best coffee shops we have been to in Nashville. We will definitely go back! Oh and we left with 3 bags of their freshly roasted coffee beans. Thanks Madera for a great experience!