I want to start by saying that in reviewing this restaurant, I did not have any issues with the food itself. I ordered two rolls and they were both sizable and tasted fresh. I did feel they were on the higher end in terms of cost, but could justify the higher price with the quality of the ingredients and portion size. My issues do not lay with the food.
I think customer service is a huge piece of a restaurant experience and being a take out restaurant (a much more limited dynamic in respect to customer service); treatment of a customer makes all the difference. While staying at the hospital with my newborn in the NICU, my husband and I were looking for local sushi places to have a little bit of an escape (since I haven't been able to eat it in almost a year!). I've never tried Sushi Red before but the reviews online looked good and the menu had a few great options for specialty rolls I could try. I selected two rolls from the menu that sounded great. I always look carefully at ingredients because I have some food allergies and my husband is a picky eater. I called ahead and ordered and their wait time was 30 mins. When I showed up, I got handed both rolls in a bag and paid with my debit card. I exited the restaurant and got into the car and opened the bag to admire my rolls. Thankfully, before pulling off, I noticed some greenery in one of the rolls that looked out of place. Upon further investigation, I realized it was thin slices of cucumber, which was not in the ingredients listed on the menu, and is an allergy of mine. I politely went back in and inquired about the cucumber and the gentleman making sushi explained that it was "just a little". I gently explained my allergy and that I couldn't have the roll with the cucumber and he asked me why I didn't say I was allergic. I replied that it wasn't listed in the ingredients of the roll on the menu for me to think that was necessary and he actually cross-referenced his own menu in front of me to verify it did not say it (which he found it did not). What!? He then *ripped* the sushi container from my hands, threw it (literally *threw* to container) on to the table behind him and yelled at me irritated, "10 mins!" I walked back out to the car to wait and something told me to check the other roll of mine to be safe, which of course, ALSO contained unexpected cucumber slices when I looked. *Insert face palm* I sheepishly went back in with the other container and before I could even say anything, the gentleman looked up at me, threw his hands in the air and walked over to the register, flipping open the compartment for dollars; clearly looking to throw money back at me. The register was seemingly empty, and he quickly called over a woman from the back who came up and asked me for my credit card. When I asked why they needed my card (because it made no sense), she and he both stopped responding to me, began speaking to one another in a language I don't know, and then she grabbed the same menu, clearly looking to see if the ingredients listed cucumber. The gag is there were other rolls which did! Just not these two rolls which I strategically ordered! She then began to berate me about communicating my allergies. I was so defeated and in such a compromised emotional state that I legitimately almost started crying. My eyes welled up and I pleaded back "if it said cucumber was in the roll; I would have" but the gentleman eventually angrily called her away to help him with re-making the rolls. I stood silently while they ignored me and he spoke angrily under his breath and her. When the rolls were done; he tossed them into a bag with a nasty attitude and handed them off to her to give to me. Neither of them could even make eye contact with me. It was like I was being punished.
I have never EVER been treated so terribly by a restaurant in my life. There's poor customer service and then there was THIS and I was completely floored that someone would have the audacity to behave this way towards a polite, paying, customer ... Especially when I was not in the wrong in any way shape or form, and was attempting to be so understanding and patient with *their* error of adding an ingredient without the customer's knowledge.
Despite the rolls eventually being made as listed and being pretty good on their own; this experience will make me never return to this establishment again. They should be embarrassed by their temper tantrum behavior and attitude towards something that was their mistake. That's not how you run a good business. read more