Kumo Rooftop — Restaurant in Carolina

We were a party of 5 with general admission paying around $200 pp for Kumo’s new years eve celebrations. The party description seemed promising with a house open bar, hors d'oeuvres, and champagne toast. However, from the moment we entered, we found it hard to get things in their establishment. We went straight to the bar to grab drinks for the group. Flagging down a bartender and getting their attention was a challenge my friends and I would painfully encounter several times through the night. It took me 30 mins to get our first round of drinks, their house cocktails. I cover my experiences over the next few hours below.

Food 4/5 Delicious finger food, but a couple of them were molten cheesy bites that came with no warning that they were too hot to consume in one bite. While the overall food quality was very good, they severely lacked the quantity to feed the crowd. We probably got 4 total pieces of hors d'oeuvres before they said the kitchen was closed just after midnight.

Drinks 2/5 3 house cocktails, all mediocre at best. At 11:25pm (yes, literally before midnight) they ran out of mixes for all of their house cocktails. And since we struggled to get drinks all night we decided to just get our champagne drinks in hand before midnight. But they said they didn’t have any bottles then as they were preparing to pass out toasts. It seemed logical until it was time for the countdown and my entire group had no drink in hand, let alone a flute of champagne as promised and advertised. It didn’t stop here, just after midnight we were back at the bar to get drinks only to find all the bartenders cheering and pouring themselves champagne. Hey, we all need to celebrate and I even cheered them on as they toasted among themselves. But then when I wanted champagne for me and my guests, they refused to pour the same stuff they were drinking and said that Prosecco was what they were serving their guests and that they were still out of bottles and couldn’t serve me. This was rude, inconsiderate and absolutely unprofessional for them to literally drink the champagne that could also be served to paying guests who at this point have not had a drink in 40 something minutes.

Entertainment 5/5 They had a live band and a DJ who were both phenomenal. Despite the lack of space to dance, we thoroughly enjoyed the vibe they set on the rooftop.

Service 1/5 Probably my worst experience at a party. Besides the things highlighted in this review, I have another issue to bring up. As it always does, we had a sudden downpour of rain and since this is rooftop event, the wind started to get many guests wet. They have rain guard/ tarps that needed to be rolled down to protect the guests from the showers but for about 5 whole minutes, not a single staff member attempted to help. A couple of guests and I ended up lowering the tarps ourselves only to get a round of applause from the crowd who were just happy not to be getting rained on at a nice party.

Value for money 1/5 I got to meet a lot of frustrated guests at the bar while waiting for drinks and everyone of them resoundingly shared the regret of paying for this party for such poor service.

I would have loved to come back with my friends for a sit down meal at Kumo, but given our terrible experiences this night, we will not be returning and we will not recommend this place to...

I seldomly complain about restaurants, but I am compelled to write this one-star review because, despite the fantastic view, this was the worst dining experience of my life.

Let's talk about the food – the mushroom skewers were nothing short of disgusting. I could barely stomach them. The prawns reeked of an overwhelming fishy smell, an indication of their less-than-fresh state. And the octopus? Oh, it was so overcooked that it resembled beef jerky in texture. Chewing on rubbery octopus was definitely not what I had in mind when I decided to dine here.

We dared to order the lamb chops, thinking they couldn't possibly mess that up, but we were mistaken. I managed to eat one lamb chop along with some rice, which was incredibly dry and flavorless, making it almost inedible. As for the second lamb chop, it was practically raw, more undercooked than a "Philadelphia rare" steak. It was repulsive, to say the least.

When the waitress finally decided to check on us, I shared my dissatisfaction with the lamb chops and the revolting mushrooms. She offered to have them recook the dishes or give us a refund. By that point, our appetites had been utterly ruined, so we chose the refund option.

Then, the manager, a small stocky, red-headed man, came over to hear about the issues. Rather than showing understanding and empathy, he chose to argue with us about the state of our barely touched plates. He claimed he could only refund half of the lamb chops because we had eaten some rice and managed to finish 2/5 of one of the lamb chops. Seriously? It's outrageous and terrible business to argue with a dissatisfied customer, especially when the food was clearly inedible.

I've worked in the restaurant industry long enough to know that if a place messes up a meal, their top priority should be making it right with the customer. The manager's attitude was beyond unprofessional and completely unacceptable.

I STRONGLY SUGGEST THAT YOU DO NOT EAT HERE. Save yourself the disappointment, the waste of time, and the insult to your taste buds. I implore you to find a different dining spot with better food and more respectful staff. This place deserves ZERO business until they learn how to treat their customers properly. The manager should be FIRED for his lack of customer service skills. Avoid this restaurant...

Dined here tonight and the service is terrible despite the pleasant ambience

I read a lot about Kumo and was excited to drive out of our way to experience it ourselves. First of all, this week there is a big festival in San Juan. Traffic is bad. We were 15 late to our reservation. When we arrived the horrendous host at the front desk said "your reservations been cancelled; you're only allowed a 15 minute grace period and I gave your seats away"... my jaw dropped. unreal. We spoke to the manager Camilla who was an absolute star. She got us seated at a beautiful table and was kind. Our waiter was very nice. We ordered the crispy rice app and wagyu with 3 sides for a main. They told us they don't have wagyu "they can't find it" so they are serving NY Strip and charged us $5 more.. even though it's on their menu.... can't make this up.

We received the sushi appetizers which was good (nothing you couldn't get at Catch in NY) but the main course was following right behind it... We thought it was so strange but the food was taking some time so we just went with it.. 5 minutes later the waiter who brought the main course returned and said sorry I had the wrong table.... OMG. We had already started eating one of the sides so he left that... when our waiter came over we asked since they made the error if we could change one of our sides to something else for when our food comes out all together hot. The waiter came back and said if we want something different they'd charge us more because even though the brought a side out by mistake 30 minutes before we had dinner that was expected to be part of our "meal". I'm sorry I've been to a lot of restaurants and this is by far worse service that any fast food restaurant.

The whole experience was really just comical embarrassing and not worth the time. Disappointing for something we were hopeful for.

We should have known during that first interaction with the host. Downfall from there. We should have left when we had a chance. Also don't get the pumpkin side it was a big halve of cold mush with no flavor.

Total letdown after the chefs...