As a border community, San Diego is filled with excellent Mexican eateries. From the neighborhood taco shop to the high end offerings downtown, we have lots to choose from. As you can imagine this makes it hard to stick out. Mario’s in La Mesa is unique enough to stick out. Let’s look at three things that make Mario’s an East County favorite.

Location: This spot takes “neighborhood restaurant” seriously. It looks like a house from the outside. Feels like a house on the inside. In fact, I’m pretty sure that this building started out life as a house. It also serves as a gateway to a neighborhood. There’s both a good and a bad side to a neighborhood location. With a tiny parking lot, you will likely have to find street parking. Also, the dining areas are pretty small. So expect a wait at high traffic times and if you have a group of more than eight… well, I’d like to see how they handled that. Maybe the patio?

Home-style: Before we went to Mario’s we had heard two must have items on the menu. First, the carne asada platter. Second, tamales. The former lived up to its billing while the latter was good but not superb. (Not sure why tamales were covered in sauce, we didn’t like it.) Besides the menu items there are a couple of things that make Mario’s amazing. The chips and salsa are fantastic. While it’s just an expected condiment at a Mexican restaurant these stood out as especially good. Also, diners were given a taster of fruit salad. The fruit salad was fantastic and added to the family-factor of our time there.

Also atypical on the menu is home-style Mexican breakfast. If you’ve never tried that it is worth the trip to La Mesa alone.

Service: The waitstaff was great! While busy during our visit I was surprised at the attention we were given. Courtesy, prompt, friendly, and knowledgeable. These are all words we thought of to describe the service we received.

The Good: Upon being seated, children are given complimentary balls of “play” dough (pizza dough) to keep them busy.  The menu features pizza and other Italian specialties such as pasta, sandwiches and salad.  My daughter always orders the Children’s Menu Ravioli.  Priced reasonably at $4.15, it includes a homemade Italian roll and small drink.  Sanfilippo’s pizza is thick crusted and piled with cheese.  It is close to perfection (this coming from a pizza snob).  A medium 12 1/2 inch pizza (6 slices) is more than enough food for my family of four.  At $10.75 for a medium cheese pizza, feeding the family is affordable too.

In addition to their dinner menu, Sanfilippo’s features generous daily lunch specials (1/2 Lasagna with Roll for $5.95 every Tuesday).  Meals are dine-in or take-out.  For take out orders, don’t forget to ask about their pizza to-go specials available Monday through Thursday nights after 5pm.

The Bad: 1) The wait.  Call ahead or dine early to avoid waiting.  Service is friendly but not always fast.  2) Parking.  Sanfilippo’s has a small private parking lot located behind their restaurant.  Parking along La Mesa Boulevard is a challenge due to limited meter parking.