Soju By Sumo x Beverley — Restaurant in England

2nd Visit (UPDATE) A revisit to Soju but this time with friend and although the food was lovely and the surroundings are gorgeous, there are some aspects that just put me off choosing to regularly dine here...and I really want to as it is a lovely venue and the food is great. I don't want this to be too critical...but I want this restaurant to succeed and some things need to improve. The price of food I think is high and is a limited menu, particularly for the Tapas style small plates. The tables for 2 are just too small for the dish sizes and if ordering additional side dishes it becomes difficult to manage. We had to get the waitress to take away our side plates and struggled with the space. The service still hasn't improved. The waiting staff are lovely, polite young staff but appear to have very little waiting experience. No knowledge of the food when asked questions before ordering, no check if our meal was OK, no check if we would like more drinks when our glasses were empty and we basically received no further service after our main course arrived. The waiting staff are not checking the room for service and are not applying basic checks for customers. Desserts...we flagged down a rushing waitress for a dessert menu (to be told the dessert menus were limited in number and were with other customers. And still no check if we would like more drinks.... So we waited and realised we had been forgotten, so we flagged another waitress down after 10 minutes and were provided with a photocopy A4 paper dessert menu (perhaps a few more copies to be made?:-) Just 3 desserts was surprising, as was the price at £8.50. After a further 10 minutes ws realised we had been forgotten again, as no-one had further checked if we actually wanted a dessert....so we stopped another passing waitress and requested the bill. The bill has an optional service charge of 10%. Now if the service was good I would have no issue with this...(we paid the service charge on the first visit as we made exceptions for the first night) but after 2 visits I have to conclude the service is not good enough to add a service charge. After some rational debate with my friend we asked the waitress to remove it as the service had just not been good.

My friend gave her first time comments as the food being excellent, but is aiming to be a high end restaurant with inexperienced staff. ..and the service is also important and adds to the experience. Just some basic service training for the waiting staff would elevate this place as a dining experience.

1st visit We dined here on the official opening night and enjoyed a lovely meal of top quality Aisan Tapas. The attention to detail on the food and the flavours were superb and the interior design of the whole place and the building restoration is amazing. It is a very relaxed and comfortable restaurant. There is also a lovely upstairs private dining area and restrooms which have also been beautifully renovated. The service was a little slow and haphazard, but this was understandable on the first night..maybe a little bit more education to the staff on the food and drink information and questions they might be asked would help things run smoother. Keeping staff up to date and informed when dishes or drinks have sold out...so they can advise customers when ordering would also be good. Our table was perhaps too small for the Tapas dishes and drinks and was a bit of a squash. Be aware the Tapas dishes arrived 2 at a time, which is acceptable, but is a problem when different dietary requirements of customers leave them waiting for the next dishes to arrive. Overall a brilliant addition, (but a little expensive) to Beverley's restaurant scene and wishing them...

This is a new restaurant, launched during very difficult economic times, which have worsened significantly since Soju opened. Such a move takes bravery, investment and self-belief ... so this review is being kept to 'what's fair and factual' hopefully subjective comment is minimal. We read the many reviews on TripAdvisor which are overwhelmingly negative ... and thought a balanced view would be more helpful to the owners who might appreciate some help and suppport. They would of course, need to 'act', a new restaurant attracting the reviews it has (generally), clearly needs to take notice of what its paying guests are saying. It is the owners restaurant, the owners choice ... but if absolutely everything in it and about it, isn't for the customer, then the future might be grim.

It's a restaurant that has been designed well, themed without being tacky. In general, the events of the past 3 years have driven people to want a closer connection with nature and natural materials ... good interior design trying to meet this desire. It looks spectacular and to the best of our knowledge is unique in the area. There are 2 interior design faults that, if corrected, would earn the business more loyalty, revenue and customers in the long run:

1. The tables for two spoil the expereince entirely, they are simply too small to make your visit comfortable physically or emotionally. Presmuably chosen to squeeze in more covers - a mistake. Success will come with fewer covers and a longer waiting list. (we - 2 people - asked to change to a table for 4 which was given to us without a problem).
2. The toilets are a long way from the restaurant floor and if there is a lift for those people who cannot manage staircases, we didn't see it (I'm sure someone will advise in a reply).

The food matches the very high standards set by the owners other eateries. It's excellent, fresh, tasty and authentic.

The service on offer wasn't equal to the quality of the surroundings and food. The team is young (some very young) and they are willing, but they have clearly not been trained effectively and the service they are able to provide isn't in keeping with the restaurants aims. Knowledge about the food, how it's cooked, ingredients, the wines etc was (in our expereince) very poor. This is a training issue and not a staff issue. It needs addressing quickly and thoroughly (we suspect the 'trainer' experience & skills are not in the business?)

The prices do not reflect the overall customer experience that they build expectation of ... lower prices would mean not having to address any of these easy-to-rectify issues.

Soju could be a 'stand-out' restaurant experience in East Yorkshire; it has all the right attributes; but for the reasons above, is falling well short of achieving such a status. Implementing our suggestions (the 2nd review here to say some of the same things) requires no further investment of money, but a significant investment of management effort & time. Not resolving these customer experience issues, will require more money but with little prospect of a return.

It could be so good ... it's on the way ... it's already better than most. Good luck we look forward to a 2nd visit and being able to update this...

WE LEFT HALFWAY THROUGH THE MEAL! Myself and my family were very much looking forward to our first outing at the restaurant. Sadly, we had to leave halfway through….. We were very impressed with the decor, which is stunning, but the tables are far too small (I could barely get my legs under the table). We were a party of 5, with 3 of us deciding to have the chefs choice (4 courses). Unfortunately, the menu was not explained to us. The dishes that were served to us, were only enough for 2 people. When the main dish was served to us (two servings of duck) it was apparent there was no dish for the third person! I was sat there without any food. When we queried this with the manager, we were told it was tapas, and you’re expected to share?!? I’m not sure how you share a duck leg between two people, with chopsticks and no plate?! I’m afraid to also say, the manager was extremely rude and unhelpful. He refused to address our complaint, and just kept repeating that he could serve another duck dish, but we would be charged. We felt we had no option but to leave, which we told him we would do, if he didn’t address the lack of food! He spoke to us like we were morons, who didn’t understand the concept of tapas. I’ve had tapas on many an occasion, and always had sufficient food served, for the amount of people eating. The food is horrendously overpriced, for what you get. I’ve never had an experience like it in a restaurant and definitely WILL NOT be returning, or...