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Came straight from the airport to try this place whose claim to fame is their Piña colada, but ended up in love with the Churrasco. Our server was kind and helpful. Unfortunately we couldn't get mojitos because they were out of mint...the Pina colada made up for it though! Creamy and full of rum. Red snapper was a little dry but the limes made up for it. Churrasco was melting in my mouth with every bite. I recommend coming here early maybe for lunch! Dinner is a vibe though! Perfect for pregaming.
Barranchina is definitely a must visit for the sake of the history and the creamy pina coladas! They also have a beautiful patio to enjoy your drink, but unfortunately it was a rainy day so they were not seating outside. The food was okay, nothing standout but I also only had a couple light bites so I can't speak for the full menu! It is indeed a very busy spot so prepare for a wait but also, the drinks make it all worth it in the end so would totally stop in after or right before a meal.
Honestly, was a bit disappointed with the piña coladas here. We added it as a must do on our trip since it's the inventors of the piña colada but they just seem like the ordinary piñas you get on beach vacations. They don't make each one fresh it's already made and just poured. A bit too icy with no unique flavors for my taste. I feel I've had better ones at resorts. It's definitely popular and you can take the drinks to go rather wait in line to be seated. If you want to check off a historic "landmark" then visit otherwise if you want to go for a good piña, I'd go elsewhere.
We heard Barrachina was the birthplace of the piña colada so stopped in while we were walking around Old San Juan. Naturally, it's very touristy. We sat at the outdoor bar in the courtyard, which was very nice! There were several frozen cocktail machines with piña coladas stirring. The bartender assured us that their piña coladas are never watered down with ice. Honestly, it was really good (and he made them strong!) However, your drink is definitely dependent on the bartender that helps you so can certainly be hit or miss. We weren't super inclined to try the food or sit inside. Definitely worth trying while in Old San Juan. You can even get a piña colada to go.
Love the venue that makes you feel like you're outside but protected and comfortable. Server was kind and effective but quite slow to get drinks and orders and food. Was there on a Thursday night and it was busy but for water... seemed like an opportunity. Pina colada was great! Refreshing! Then we got the app for four and we had six people...still too much food so maybe opt for a smaller size. It was just ok. Hard to manage with all fried things. The fish was outstanding, corn nuggets great, the other stick thing was good but the mofungos were a pass. Needed seasoning and sauce. Then I got the grouper island special. Also a pass. The sauce was fine but it made the fish soggy. Perhaps if it was separate then things would taste better? Beans were good also. This wouldn't be my first choice back because of slow service and the food but for drinks, I'm in!
This is the first meal I had in San Juan, and it was a little underwhelming. The service was great, food was a little pricey but as expected in a touristy area. Pina Colada was the star of the show, amazing, rejuvenating, refreshing pina colada. The special sampler left a bit more to be desired. Most of the things were good but some items on the plate were slacking in flavor and were carried by other elements of the dish like the empanadas were amazing.
We stopped by Barrachina because of it's legacy as the "birthplace of the piña colada." We got coladas as well as some calamari for the table. The coladas were very strong (I think all the rum was all at the bottom), but it tasted great. Calamari tasted fine as well. Definetely more of a touristy spot but enjoying the outdoor seating while sipping on coladas was a nice experience. Service was very fast, considering how busy it was when we got there in the mid-afternoon.
This is such a beautiful restaurant and located in a nice area in old San Juan Puerto Rico. Stopped by after having lunch at Raices and wish i wouldn't have. I wish i would have planned to eat here and another day at raices as the food looked really good. However we came for the Piña Colada and it was good. I will def be returning
Home of the original piña colada, Barrachina is a must visit in San Juan! We decided to stop by for an app and drinks on a Friday and had to wait 30 minutes to be seated. We all ordered piña coladas and the corn fritters to share. The fritters were delicious! Perfectly sweet with a tasty spicy sauce on the side. The piña colada's were strong and refreshing! Definitely worth a try!
7 months ago
Stopped in with a friend to have a Piña Colada where it is said to have originated over 60 years ago! The Piña Coladas are now premixed and frozen (they weren't 60 years ago), served out of a slushie machine and then topped with a tropical garnish and a small rum floater which you stir in. While enjoyable, it's nothing like a homemade Piña Colada, and probably not much like the first ones served. Bartender Brian (pictured) was very pleasant and made our visit enjoyable. If you haven't been, stop in and see where history is said to have been made! read more
We came and tried the original pina coladas that many people have been raving about! It was super refreshing and lived up to the hype in my opinion. It was sweet and icey and amazing super glad that I got to try it at San Juan. read more
Ordered only drinks: Piña colada: 7/10- More of an icee than a smoothie, pineapplish BACARDÍ 10 yr: 8/10 Bacardi 8 year: 9/10 10yr has a different taste as expected, but I'm not a big fan of it. Customer service was excellent! The bar is mid building so the breeze and upward view is beautiful. Nice place to stop after sight seeing. read more
A classic. I've been here on three separate times and I will continue to go. The piña colada is special. It is smooth, not too strong, and can easily have three in one seating. They had a seating area, but you can also go to the back and order to go if there is a long line. The line was long, but it moves fast. read more
1 year ago
Barrachina is known as home to the birthplace of the Pina Colada and is located in the heart of Old San Juan. The Pina Colada ($8.96) is made with Don Q rum and did not disappoint. I would only come here to try their Pina Colada though. The food was a bit of a miss. The Calamari breaded with coconut ($10) was a bit too sweet for my liking. We also got the Puerto Rico Delight ($9), which lets you try an assortment of their appetizer, including turnovers, corn fritters, and croquettes. Service was okay. Our server did not really check up on us. In fact, we had to wait a while to order. When we were ready for the bill, we had to go to the bar to actually get the check as well. There is plenty of seating both indoors and outdoors in their beautiful courtyard (where the bar is). read more
We come here for lunch after 4 hours walking at both fort. Our waiter is very nice, he constantly come to fill the water in our glass, we ordered Spanish rice with meat and sea food. It comes in about 30 mins. It's different from what i had before, seems it was not cooked in the cast iron pan directly, more like they stirred everything together, then put in a frying pan. It has a lot of stuff in it, and plantain too. Though there is no crust since it was not cooked in this pan. but it's tasty and maybe a little too salty to my taste. Huge quantities and could definitely feed 3 hungry adults. read more
5 months ago
fried plantains were fire and the mofongo was good, but i wasn't crazy overwhelmed with the vibes. i was so excited to try the house of the pina colada but alas it was so strong i still drank it read more
1 year ago
If you are in San Juan, definitely stop by for a pina colada. Delicious! For food I had the shrimp mofongo and it was just ok, it needed more garlic flavor. read more
10 months ago
Server - tall skinny dude was rude; rolled his eyes when i followed up on a request to chop the chuleta can can when the original server said yes. Then it came dry, rice too hard (how can you screw up rice?) the arroz con pollo came literally chicken breast dry with hard rice. Not only food nasty but 2nd server only damages the reputation of the hard work employees there. Cooks had a bad day but damn what a bad experience. read more
I started off with the soup of the day which was chicken and rice. For my entrée I ordered the shrimp mofongo and that was out of this world!!! It was flavorful, fresh, delicious all 10's across the board. Barrachina is known for their famous Piña colada; it is a must. I tried it and I see why people were lining up just for the Piña colada. I had to restrain myself from ordering another! My time there was great. read more
Unfortunately this place definitely seemed like a tourist trap and was the worst food we had all vacation. The chicken tenders were very rubbery and our waiter never came back so I wasn't able to get any sauce with it. We had an appetizer with plantain and the plantain tasted old/stale. My boyfriend got the mofongo, which he's had a few times and loved at other restaurants. Unfortunately here, it was almost inedible because neither the plantain nor the chicken tasted fresh. It is cool that this place is where the pina colada was created though and you can get one with or without alcohol. I got mine without alcohol and it was enjoyable - not too sweet. Overall I'd only recommend going for a pina colada because there are so many other great places to eat in the area read more
Definitely a tourist spot kinda place - it's good for a reason but caters to tourists. Busy - had to wait about 35 min but the host was helpful. Refillable tap water is a blessing. Supposedly the home of the pina colada - delicious but it separates quickly because of the ingredients. Flank steak mofongo was good - my friends chicken one was better and had more flavor though. The lettuce was annoying to pick around. Shrimp in garlic sauce appetizer was good but also served on a bed of iceberg salad which was weird - only 5 shrimp too. Pretty restaurant. read more
Nice spot with a bunch of lovely options. Great place for tourists. Delicious pina coladas. Cute shop with a bunch of souvenirs. Service was excellent. Waiter was very attentive and helpful. No language barrier for English speakers. read more
This in the place that created the piña colada over 60 years ago. So with that, you can expect this place to be busy. The menu is adequate although I went there specifically for pastelón which I was told they served. They do not. I did eat and had these mini mofongo bowls with shrimps and served with a broth. Very tasty. The place is typical of a tropical restaurant. Lively music and great service. Everyone I encountered was fluent in English so no struggles there. I'd definitely return the next time I'm in PR. read more
Love it here for the piña coladas alone! The staff was attentive, quick, and funny. Amazing service overall and can't wait to come again. Piña colada with rum was $10 and as a celebratory souvenir for their anniversary, you can get a different cup for $12. The atmosphere was very open and breezy. Counting down to the day I return haha! read more
We had to make a stop at the Birthplace of the Pina colada's before leaving PR. The atmosphere was chill and the bartender was very real and talkative. Gave very good suggestions on places to go to (thinking that was our first day lol). read more
Honestly I will say only come here for the pina colada. It's for the culture, and very tasty, not very strong, but still very cute and festive. The food is only okay. The grilled salmon barely came with veggies and the sweet plantains were very dry. The grilled steak stir fry was very good but reminded me of pot roast. Our appetizer was good but seemed a little over fried. I wouldn't come back for food. We enjoyed our pina coladas but definitely didn't catch a buzz from them. They also don't have many other drink options. The restaurant does have a very beautiful set up. I recommend wearing a nice outfit to take pictures. read more
1 year ago
It was a really long wait. Only one person working the bar and they seemed to have had a problem with the machines. Great place to visit and a must see as its claim to have made the first pina colada is a staple for visits here. Pina Colada itself was delicious.. a little watery (as I think the machine problem was going on) but it was good and priced reasonably read more
We added Barrachina to our do list because we heard that they were the home of the pina colada and people said it was a must include online. Upon arrival on a Tuesday afternoon, there was a 45 minute wait, so we added our names to the list and went to kill time walking around in Old San Juan. When we returned, we were seated inside within 1-2 minutes. Our server was kind and welcomed us with menus and asked us what we would like to drink. We opted for the pina colada (with rum) and water. Because we were trying to make an excursion, we only ordered appetizers. My friends ordered chicken wings, grouper bites and I ordered a side of calamari and some plantains. My food came out lukewarm and it was underwhelming. My friends like their wings. The grouper bites were sweet. I liked them better than the calamari, but it was still on the warm side versus hot. The pina colada was delicious. Once I returned back to our hotel room, I had an upset stomach and had to run to the restroom. I hope it was not because of the food or drinks. Overall, it was not worth the hype or wait time AND I would only go back for a pina colada. read more
1 year ago
This restaurant is the home and creator of the piña colada! Well, I don't typically like piña colada's at all. I obviously ordered one here, it was the most delicious one I've had in my entire life and it was worth the stop! However, I will say we were all extremely disappointed by the food. We ordered the traditional dish of Puerto Rico, which is Mofongo and it was dry and slightly tasteless. The men ordered the whole red snapper and said it was very good however, it does come as the whole fish! The location and decor inside the restaurant and bar area are really great and our servers were very attentive. Due to its popularity, you will have to wait for a table, if you only want to try the drink, you can ask to go up to the bar and get a piña colada to go , if I would've known how the food was, we would've only stopped for the drink and gotten dinner elsewhere. read more
2 years ago
This place is very commercial. The waiters are extremely rude and they don't have a good way of connecting with people. They don't even put efforts to understand what we are saying or try to ask question they are extremely upfront and rude in saying things we didn't have a pleasant experience going to this place I understand, but there is a history behind this restaurant and how the piña colada was created over here, but that doesn't give them Any right to treat their customers bad especially the bartender that I was working with was extremely rude. he didn't even responded to some of the questions I had. We also asked him for the coffee which he did even care to come back and say he don't have it and even for the food they were they were not answering the questions properly. I don't think we're gonna go back just to have a peanut again but I don't recommend this place. read more
2 years ago
Many have said that this place has the best piña coladas. Do I agree? Not really. The line gets pretty long especially if you've arrived from a cruise ship. It's about a 20 minute walk (depending on how fast you walk) from the cruise ship port. There are 2 lines when you get to the restaurant. 1 is to dine in/to be seated and the other is to grab a piña colada to go from the bar. We waited a good hour for the to go line. I was expecting a better tasting piña colada but it the taste was pretty basic to me. If the line is too long, don't waste your time on it and would recommend exploring the beautiful city. read more
I really do not enjoy giving under 3 stars- I understand everyone has their bad days and I typically just let it go. Unfortunately this was a very very bad experience. We sat down and asked for water. We were given 2 menus and 2 silverware's- there were 5 of us. The water never came. We got to the point to ask another waitress to give us some water. We were told they would tell our waiter... instead of getting us water. I wasnt timing anything but it was a long time of getting no help from anyone. At that point we decided to not order food and get our pina coladas to go. Our waiter finally came (with no waters) and we told him we would like pina coladas to go- no food. That made him upset. We then asked if we could get waters. We didn't get waters. When our 5 pina coladas came - after a long time of waiting- we again asked for waters. He slammed one cup of water down on the table for us and left. We asked someone else for water for the other 4 people. Our waiter came back (I guess after being told we wanted more water) and gave us one more glass of water. The 5 of us just shared the 2 waters and left with our pina coladas. read more
Fantastic food and very very cool ambience with somewhat slow confusing service. Overall a solid 4 star experience. 5 star food: the truly excellent Puerto Rican specialties are the star of this show. Try anything involving plantains and you can't go wrong. Unlike many other places nearby, their food is not a pan-Caribbean/Latin mixture but primarily local PR specialties. 5 star ambience: the space is primarily the interior courtyard of an old colonial building and oozes charm. They have a very crowded bar aside the restaurant. Sleekly designed but authentic. 3 star service: the front desk was overwhelmed with 4 mega cruise ships at once. Check-in was confusing with a large mob unaware there was a signup sheet for an hour wait on dining, but a faster moving bar line. Inside was a little better but also slow with overwhelmed servers. read more
1 year ago
Avoid this place if you want to eat. Food is super bland! Food is overpriced! We opted to sit at the bar rather than wait 30 minutes for a table. Bartender was nice but could see that not everyone was receiving the same level of service. Vegetables are not fresh. The mushrooms came from a can. Baby carrots definitely came out of a bag. Salmon was okay. Beans were horrible. Cream of Broccoli soup was luke warm & and served after the meal was delivered. Mofongo with overcooked shrimp was tasteless. Perhaps they are counting on cruise ship passengers coming in and overpaying and they figure they won't be coming back anyway so who cares what we serve them? One star because I did enjoy the Pina Colada. read more
1 year ago
The place is really nice, very pretty. Super chic. We only ordered piña coladas, but they have a to go area to order which sped up the process. No wait, recommended if you're in the area, specially since it states it's the place where piña coladas were invented. Overall, very good tbh read more
This place has soooo much potential. It's located in Old San Juan, close to a cruise port also. All of the bartenders just seem to hate working there, the energy was dead, environment was dead, it was disappointing. The service is very slow. The lead bartender would help one guest then come to the other side of the bar and complain out loud that "there was too many kids", specifically talking about the adults not knowing what they want; theirs no kids on the premises. Overall, they were kinda rude and killed the experience. I wish they knew, that on social media this place is one of the top spots a tourist wants to visit. They could be thriving! $30 a bit overpriced. You're better off going to a local spot to grab food and drinks! read more
Little old restaurant tucked away in the heart of Old San Juan serving authentic puerto rican food. Decided to come here based off of the numerous amount of suggestions by locals, and the food did not disappoint. I ordered the fried red snapper and a pina colada and my friends ordered other dishes and also a pina colada. This restaurant in particular is known for their pina coladas and for double the price of the regular one, you can get a souvenir cup with a logo celebrating their 60th anniversary of their pina coladas on the side of your drink. Personally I am not a fan of coconut, but I enjoyed the colada, you can definitely taste the rum, wish it were more frozen though. The fried red snapper was delicious, wish they gave a little more vegetables on the side, but other than that it felt like eating a typical meal at home: bowl of rice and a fried fish as the entree. Tried some of the pork belly which was very crispy and flavorful. Service here was alright, kept asking for utensils because there were only 2 set, when there was three, took quite a few tries of asking them to finally get some silverware. For the price, I would recommend coming here for some Puerto Rican food if you are in the area. read more
5 months ago
A must stop in Old San Juan. We stopped here because it's the iconic house of piña colada. There were 2 lines: 1 for a drink to go and 1 for drinking and eating at the restaurant. We waited around 30 minutes for a table. We ordered 2 piña coladas, 1 puerto rican delights appetizer, 1 chicken stir fry, and 1 steak stir fry. The wait time for food was slightly long since it was a busy restaurant, so we were happy to have the drink and appetizer. Food was tasty and so was the drink! This place may seem like a 1 and done but we would visit if in the area again! read more
Service is a little "island time-y", but the food is delicious and the pina coladas are legendary! The grouper isleno was delicious! My wife wanted something simple and just got the grilled chicken plate and it was tasty and well cooked! A worthwhile stop in Viejo San Juan! read more
10 months ago
Stopped for the Pina Colada. Talked story with Jorge the bartender. He had been with Barrachina for 35 years. Very down to earth. He even agreed to pictures, not ordinary, he said come behind the bar. Great experience, service, and drink! read more
11 months ago
The pina colada & seafood monfongo were both delicious. I highly recommend this place to others. read more
10 months ago
this place is horrible. Bad service. The drinks aren't good. Honestly save your money and go somewhere else. read more
6 months ago
More info about Barrachina
C. de la Fortaleza 104
San Juan, Puerto Rico 00901
Directions
(787) 725-7912
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Visit Website
http://www.barrachina.com/
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