Welcome to El Tenampa Mexican Restaurant
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655 Rte 72 E Starboard Plaza Manahawkin, NJ 08050 Hotline: (609) 597-0938
Great food. Highly recommend Sopa Campasina and Taco Salad with blackened steak. Good service too.
This place has the best Mexican food around. Not fancy but good. We have been going there for 22 years. The staff is pleasant the chef is the best and the free salsa and chips are worth buying and bringing home.
Food is always delicious, and love the chips and salsa. Crab cake appetizer is amazing and enchiladas are so good.
My favorite Mexican restaurant in this area. The chimichanga is delicious. I like the variety of sauces you can have. I like the white cheese on the side. Today I tried the sopa campisina soup with broth veggie, bits of nacho strips, bits of steak and shrimp, and cilantro. It was like a Mexican style ramen soup... delicious! Definitely a return. I have ordered and picked up before, but this is the first time I dined in. I will return.
Everything is good down to the complementary salsa that is served when you are seated. The atmosphere feels authentic and the food is presented respectably too.
Wonderful ,, my husbands chilli rejeno were a perfect veggie meal with a red sauce I would eat like alone!!! The staff is very friendly and wonderful !
We went here yesterday afternoon. Labor Day. Very happy with the food. Their Mexican food is exactly how I like it. We had enchiladas & burrito dinners. Will definitely go back for meals. The waitress was friendly and helpful w our selections. It's a must go again place, And clean. Plenty of food for your money.
El Tenampa was the closest Mexican restaurant to our house and never got a chance to try it until now. Quiet atmosphere and really nice wait staff. Entrees we're delicious and reasonably priced. I wasn't bringing my A game that night because I ordered jalapeños rellenos aka frozen store bought jalapeño poppers. Just take those off the menu. It was the one thing that didn't belong. Love their authentic stuff though. One of the freshest and tastiest salsa I've ever had. Didn't go for dessert because most of the options were deep fried. Mostly wins here and will go back again!!!
Ole! Oh lala! Oh where are the shrimp? It was an interesting contrast of experiences as we decided to go TGIF Mexican! We had been here before but that was long before the missing year became a reality for everyone. However we knew that this was one of those Mexican eating establishments that promise good food. We were the early birds but we were welcomed with warmth by the restaurant staff to the empty restaurant where one table was already set up for a large party. It was noticeable that the menu was either condensed or presented in a more clear fashion than in years past. This is not one of those Mexican restaurants with an overwhelming number of options for you to eat. But the standards were there plus a few interesting options and it did not take long to make our choices. The prerequisite bowl of chips was delivered to the table and these were clearly homemade. I always prefer homemade but even though these were down towards the bottom in the top of the top 10 list they were still pretty good. The red salsa that was delivered to the table with the chips was on the sweeter side and there was no spice kick. I imagine we could have asked for the heat but that would have only been for me. If I didn't mention it before the service was friendly and they kept their eye on us even as the restaurant started to fill up. It was disappointing to not see any of the staff wearing a mask especially since Covid numbers are going up but the hospitality was clear, they cared about us. We skipped appetizers although I have to admit I looked at the sopa options a couple of times before saying nah. The chalkboard had some interesting beverage options but give me water with a lemon stuck in it anytime of day and night. Of course BYOB's an option but we didn't think about that in advance. My choice was on the back page of the menu under their specialties. It was Pechuga Tejana, which Is chicken breast and shri mp for those who enjoy medium spicy dishes. The other choices of the night were tricolored enchilada cheese and a chicken burrito in white sauce. First the waitress was thrilled when the burrito was ordered with white sauce telling us that was her favorite sauce of the many sauce options this restaurant offers. The bulging burrito truly had a yummy sauce but that's not what I ordered. The really neat thing about the tri-colored enchilada in addition to each enchilada being doused in its own unique sauce was that you received a cheese enchilada, a chicken enchilada, and a beef enchilada. The sauces were designed to match the colors of the Mexican flag obviously. The diner who made this choice could not have been happier and continue to talk about the enchiladas on the drive away from the restaurant. I like things spicy but I decided to accept the medium spicy advertisement of the menu for my meal. The sauce was absolutely delicious but as I looked at my plate and I reflected on the fact that it was advertised as chicken breast and shrimp I began to wonder where the shrimp that had fallen off were because there were only three shrimp on my plate. The chicken breasts were pounded thin and it was really tasty but even though the three shrimp were jumbo shrimp I felt short changed on my shrimp. But that's a small complaint when you put the sauce memory into action because I can still taste how good it was. Speaking of being short-changed ... If you like refried beans you're not going to get many on your plate here. Each meal came with a scoop of rice and as they say in my favorite bagel shop a schmeer of refried beans. We did not go home hungry but I would have liked a little more beans to soak up some of that delicious sauce on my plate. So Ole ... oh la la .. And since this is near the ocean I'll go looking for the missing shrimp. Great service and delicious food you can't go wrong.
