Agave & Rye Covington

Tried this place for the first time last night for date night. My girlfriend had been here before and enjoyed it, so we decided to give it a shot. We arrived around 8 PM on a busy Saturday night. They took our name and quoted a 30-minute wait, which wasn’t a problem—we grabbed a drink at a nearby bar while we waited. When our table was ready, we were seated in an overflow dining area next door. The decor and ambiance were similar to the main restaurant, so no complaints there. Service started off fine but declined pretty quickly. There were about seven tables in our section, plus a bar area. One of the tables was a large group, but they were already finished eating when we walked in and left shortly after. So not a lot of folks on our side. We ordered drinks, chips and queso, and our entrées. The drinks came out quickly and were good, and the chips and queso followed soon after. The queso itself was just okay—nothing memorable, but a decent snack while waiting for our main dishes. For my meal, I ordered a taco flight with the Plain Jane, the Happy Pappy, and the Filthy Fajita. The Plain Jane was the best of the three, but still nothing special. The Happy Pappy was just okay—the carnitas were a bit dry. The Filthy Fajita, however, was straight-up bad. The steak was so tough I had to spit it out, and I ended up removing it from the taco entirely. On top of that, I could tell my tacos had been sitting for a while based on how the queso had hardened—definitely not ideal. My girlfriend ordered the Birria Ramen (which we heard is being removed from the menu soon) and the Becky taco. The ramen was pretty good—not the best birria we’ve had, but it got the job done. Thankfully, she had a better taco experience than I did—she really enjoyed The Becky. The wait for our food was long, but given how busy they were (and the time needed to cook the ramen), it was somewhat understandable. What wasn’t understandable was how long it took to get our check once we finished eating. By this point, the room had mostly emptied out, but despite our server clearly seeing that we were done, we sat for what felt like forever waiting to pay. It felt like we were on their time, which was frustrating. All in all, this place won’t be getting a return visit from me. The service was subpar, and the food wasn’t worth the $80 tab. For that price, I know we could have had a much better meal—and experience—somewhere else.