Mama Kims — Restaurant in Charleston

If you have a crying/screaming child, skip this place. The owner will make sure you feel unwelcome and give you unsolicited parenting advice and insulting comments. We were out with our almost two year old son all day, followed by a trip to the ER because our son hurt his arm. We were hungry and just wanted something quick and close to our hotel. 30 minutes into our wait, our son started to get cranky because he was hungry and tired. Three police officers who came after us were personally served by the owner by then. The owner passed our table and told our son to behave or the police would discipline him or something. I was shocked but let it slide because my son obviously didn't understand her. After another 10-15 minutes our food still didn't come and our son was having a tantrum, so we asked for the food to go. My husband later told me the owner asked if I was Chinese and made a comment about my parenting style and Chinese parents in general. My husband just wanted to grab our food and get the heck out so he didn't say anything back to her. We got back to our hotel only to find they missed my son's "express" bowl. (Yeah that's after an hour wait.) I went back to the restaurant and they completely did not realize the missing order. I decided to have a talk with the owner, and things got very ugly there. She complained our son was screaming the moment we stepped into her restaurant and it was so untrue. She didn't apologize for our food being delayed or even missing. Instead she accused me for being a bad mother. Wow. Just when I got into the restaurant the second time, I saw the three police officers leaving and her trying to force some free food on them. I was appalled and perplexed. How can a business owner treat customers so blatantly preferential, and racist might I say?! Had she made sure our food came timely and correctly we could've avoided all this unpleasantness. Oh, and the food? Overpriced and not all it's cracked up to be. Definitely not worth the...

I placed an order to pick up 2 hours after placing order since I wasn't going to be able to get there sooner and I wanted fresh food. I then get a notification that my food was ready 1 hour and 15 mins earlier than when I was going to get there to pick it up. I tried to call the restaurant to let them know I want my food fresh and not sitting for 1 hour and 15 mins and they would answer the calls (5 call attempts) and not speak. I even had my mother call them from a different number and they did the same, pick up calls and not speak. What kind of establishment is this? Thia is unacceptable customer service. I then go to restaurant and let them know I want them to redo my food since I want fresh food and I had specifically scheduled my pickup later to get fresh food on my arrival. The manager had the nerve to ask me, side-eyed, if I didn't have a microwave, like really??? I told him I don't because I'm from out of town and staying at a hotel, and really, who wants fried dumplings costing $40 microwaved?? NOT ME! They redid the order but to be honest I am not eating it because who knows what they did to my food in the back. This is ridiculous and not supposed to happen to anyone just wanting fresh food to eat...

To be honest I used to love this place. I always loved ordering the chicken bowl with the fried rice but lately my experiences have not been well. Might I add also that when I went here with my friend she ordered the steak dinner but they charged her on accident for the veggie dinner, and when they brought her the veggie dinner she clarified and said that she got the steak dinner. Most business owners would remake without any problems but mama came up to us and made her go up and pay the $2 difference?!! I mean really, they’re the ones who screwed up the order, as the customer she should have just let her pay for the veggie dinner... my most recent experience is really what drove me to post this review. At mama kims you can buy their white sauce for $9 and its a good size, so I decided to buy it. I used it at my place and it tasted like smooth mayo... not anything like white sauce. Very disappointed because I paid $9 for a sauce that I could have bought at the grocery store and it would have probably tasted better. Also Mama has raised prices and lowered portion sizes while the quality of the food has gone down. Will have to find another Hibachi place in the area, used to love this place but will have to finally...