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GDC
7/6/2011, 08:48 AM
I miss it.
Partial Qualifier
7/6/2011, 09:22 AM
There used to be one on Penn & Britton. Forever ago.

Hold on - Casa Bonita's the place where you'd raise a flag to alert the wait staff of your need for service - correct? And later they went to an all-out buffet??
Boomer.....
7/6/2011, 09:24 AM
Isn't it still open in Tulsee?

I thought it was meh. (Yes I realize that it was the reopened one after the fire.)
jumperstop
7/6/2011, 09:33 AM
http://blogs.westword.com/latestword/assets_c/2009/01/Casa_Bonita-thumb-250x253.jpg
jumperstop
7/6/2011, 09:34 AM
Apparently they have a lot in Colorado still. Found some while searching for that picture.
dynersooner
7/6/2011, 09:35 AM
and Crystals...
DIB
7/6/2011, 09:37 AM
The only one left is in Denver. I actually went a couple months again, when I was there on business. The food and service was just as awful as I remember, but at least there was some sweet cliff diving.
GDC
7/6/2011, 10:33 AM
Heh, when you GIS "Casa Bonita" some not so safe for work images come up.:hot:

http://www.artifacting.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/CasaBonitaMenu1.jpg
cleller
7/6/2011, 12:22 PM
Wow. Casa was a big deal when I was in my teens and early 20s. (late 70's early 80's). We'd get a gang together, stand in line on a Saturday night, and eat ourselves sick. A real event. I always thought the food was great, but did not get out to eat much in those days.

Fun times, and a good cross-section of society there, like going to the fair. Sappy nostalgia.
jdsooner
7/6/2011, 02:41 PM
I ate at the one in Tulsa when it reopened a few years ago. Let's just say that it wasn't what I remembered and I didn't run up the flag for seconds.
Jacie
7/6/2011, 02:51 PM
Returning from a ski trip to Steamboat, the bus stopped at one in Denver. There was a waterfall I was seated next too and a mariachi band. The waterfall was so loud table conversation was a screaming match and the mariachi band was irritating in that they wouldn't stop playing or go to another part of the restaurant. Sopapillas were good though . . .
ouwasp
7/6/2011, 04:00 PM
Used to be a good time. The food was usually TV-dinner quality, maybe just a bit better. But the last time we went, the server had all the personality of a wadded up paper towel... and the food had really declined...

Shame about Crystal's. That was another good spot.
StoopTroup
7/6/2011, 04:05 PM
I grew up in the Nathan Hale District when I was younger. Casa Bonita, Sears and the Fairgrounds were my stomping grounds.
XingTheRubicon
7/6/2011, 04:44 PM
that bear scared me when I was little
soonerhubs
7/6/2011, 04:54 PM
Casa Bonitas was the dinner of choice after our little elementary school took its field trip to Bells Amusement park.

What's sad is that the all three establishments including my school are now closed. :(
OUmillenium
7/6/2011, 05:28 PM
Casa Bonita in OKC was cool in the late 80s. I miss it. Never ate at the one in Tulsa, wife said it was gross.
mgsooner
7/6/2011, 06:04 PM
Every "person" over the age of two must purchase a meal. Wow.
Wishboned
7/6/2011, 06:08 PM
When we were little no trip to Tulsa was complete without eating at Casa Bonita. When I moved back from Florida I took my daughters there. They both got sick that night.


Ahhhh nostalgia.
OKC-SLC
7/6/2011, 06:20 PM
that bear scared me when I was little

straight up.
mgsooner
7/6/2011, 06:21 PM
http://www.ithew.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2010/05/DSC_0044.jpg
soonerprices
7/6/2011, 06:34 PM
As a kid I thought it was awesome. We ate at the one in Tulsa once or twice a year. About 10 years ago my wife and I took a group of kids to grand lake and on the way back we stopped there and ate. I had built it up as an awesome place for Mexican food. After we ate I realized it wasn't as good as I remember and my tasted for Mexican food was greatly questioned by the group.
goingoneight
7/6/2011, 06:50 PM
I miss the old CB. Especially now that its empty building is only a mile away from my house. :(

Okay, okay... I miss the sopapillas more than anything else. If you could find a way to get one of these real Messican food joints into that atmosphere and keep those sopapillas, I'd nevar leave.
Mongo
7/6/2011, 07:04 PM
Casa Bonita makes Panchos seem deelishus
MamaMia
7/9/2011, 08:54 PM
The food is not the same as it use to be back in the day. Its all different, and very disgusting now.
OU_Sooners75
7/9/2011, 09:01 PM
I miss Ponchos!
CrimsonKel
7/9/2011, 09:34 PM
Taco Beuno used to be a part of the Casa Bonita empire if memory serves. I always though their taco filling tasted a lot like Casa Bonita's taco filling.

Not sure now the the empire has crumbled and the detractors have won the day (and had their way).

Hey, check it out. There's a Wikipedia page for Casa Bonita. Here's link guys: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casa_Bonita.
MamaMia
7/9/2011, 09:57 PM
Taco Beuno used to be a part of the Casa Bonita empire if memory serves. I always though their taco filling tasted a lot like Casa Bonita's taco filling.

Not sure now the the empire has crumbled and the detractors have won the day (and had their way).

Hey, check it out. There's a Wikipedia page for Casa Bonita. Here's link guys: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casa_Bonita. Yes, it is very similar to what Casa Bonita use to be in some ways. They too however have changed their cheese sauce and dramatically. The salsa is the same as Casa Bonita's use to be. Not bad for fast food take out. Actually, its the only Mexican fast food take out; the kind that has a drive thru, that I will eat.

The big change is that Casa Bonita stopped making that lighter more expensive type of cheese sauce and they changed so much more. The beans are thicker and more dried and the tamales are made with a different masa recipe than they use to be made with. The spices are all different as well. They use less chili powder and more cumin than the original Casa Bonita did, at what was it...39th and Portland?
CrimsonKel
7/9/2011, 10:11 PM
It was 39th and Portland. The building has been torn down if memory serves.
Sooner_Tuf
7/10/2011, 01:27 AM
Thirty years ago we used to like the one in Denver pretty well.

Crystals? Was that the place that used the slogan "When you feel a little mexican"?
SoonerBread
7/10/2011, 05:17 AM
Thirty years ago we used to like the one in Denver pretty well.

Crystals? Was that the place that used the slogan "When you feel a little mexican"?

Not sure about the slogan, but I think the Crystal's they're talking about was a pizza joint.
CrimsonKel
7/10/2011, 07:02 AM
Not sure about the slogan, but I think the Crystal's they're talking about was a pizza joint.

Crystal's was a pizza place in OKC. There were actually two of them that I know of. There was a big one at the corner of NW Expressway and Rockwell in front what is now Target. There was another one on the South Side at I-240 and Penn where Mazzio's is now located.

Crystal's had good pizza IMHO. Their restaurants were highly stylized (for lack of a better term) in a kind of Bohemian Italian way (again for a lack of a better term) and had big arcades.

It was another 70s and early 80s thing. Its one of the things I miss about the 70s and early 80s. They had personality. I'm sure that there are advantages to the way corporations/chains have taken over the world since then but one of the disadvantages to that development IMHO is that the individual personality of places like Crystal's seems to have gone the way of the dodo. Personality must not be very cost effective for the big chains. The predictableness of chains is nice but at the same time their sameness gets a little boring after a while.
RacerX
7/10/2011, 07:25 AM
Crystal's....eating pizza in the movie room.
Breadburner
7/10/2011, 08:23 AM
Crystals and Casa Bonita and Tulsa were on the opposite ends of a strip center....
sooner59
7/10/2011, 12:43 PM
We need a Studio Movie Grill in OK. The closest thing we have is the balcony in Moore at Warren and it's pretty expensive.
texaspokieokie
7/10/2011, 12:47 PM
Crystal's....eating pizza in the movie room.

there's a "Crystal's" in irving,tx.
Sooner_Tuf
7/10/2011, 09:05 PM
Not sure about the slogan, but I think the Crystal's they're talking about was a pizza joint.

That is right. I think it was Chi Chi's that had the slogan "When You Feel a Little Mexican".
Wishboned
7/10/2011, 09:12 PM
Chi Chi's was forever getting busted for breaking the liquor by the drink laws pre 1984.
mgsooner
7/10/2011, 09:18 PM
Chi Chis sounds like a Mexican teet bar
Partial Qualifier
7/10/2011, 09:40 PM
If you're gonna Feel a Little Mexican, you better do it before she turns 22 or so, and/or has kids.

It very quickly won't be "little" anymore :eek:
GDC
8/14/2011, 09:30 AM
Drove by where it and Crystal's were on Sheridan in Tulsa yesterday, made me miss them.
SanJoaquinSooner
8/14/2011, 09:41 AM
As a kid I thought it was awesome. We ate at the one in Tulsa once or twice a year. About 10 years ago my wife and I took a group of kids to grand lake and on the way back we stopped there and ate. I had built it up as an awesome place for Mexican food. After we ate I realized it wasn't as good as I remember and my tasted for Mexican food was greatly questioned by the group.


I'm reminded of that Let It To Beaver episode, "Beaver's Old Buddy"

Beaver's old friend comes to stay, and Beaver discovers that things aren't as they used to be.

Y'all remember that?