Beloved Mexican restaurant closes down

The+restaurant+formerly+known+as+Nicos+under+construction.+

Samantha Acosta

The restaurant formerly known as Nico’s under construction.

Samantha Acosta, Staff Writer

The Grotto, officially known as Nico’s, the restaurant across from the school, has closed down and is currently under construction inside the building. No one really knows what the building will be, and many students who went there for lunch now wonder why the place closed down.

  The building was a Mexican restaurant, which had a menu specifically for Gresham students. The signature food was the fries,they were cheap and made fairly quick which brought in many customers. The restaurant was busiest during lunch because many students went during that time.

  There were also students from the school that worked at the Grotto during their lunch, and others worked there over the summer before they closed down.

  “I kinda enjoyed it, it just got really boring, and during school (it) was busy, but not as much over the summer,” four-year employee Ivan Zaragoza said

  The reason why Nico’s closed down was because they were going to remodel the building.

  “They closed to remodel, Blad (the renter/cook) isn’t going to be able to afford to rent it as a Mexican restaurant after the remodel, because it’ll cost too much,” junior Wynter Mitchell said.  

  Many students miss the restaurant and the delicious food that they had. Students had more options at Nico’s then the La Herradura, the other mexican restaurant that is nearby.

  “I miss Nico’s because they had asada fries, and the other mexican restaurant doesn’t have that. There aren’t any other restaurants around so when they closed down it kinda sucked,” junior Lilana Calderon said.

  There still is not any news about what the new building is going to become. Now and then you see people working inside the restaurant, but with the bad weather it has been pretty vacant. The students want something that Nico’s provided because there’s not many other restaurants that are close by, the prices were cheap and the quality of the food was good.