Urban Soul Restaurant — Restaurant in Detroit

My family and I dined at this establishment June 2016. I love soul food and good food is hard to find unless you make it yourself for the most part. With time constraints and just wanting to sit and enjoy a nice meal we decided on Urban Soul. When we arrived we figured it would be quite crowded as we were part of the church crowd. We were told the wait would be 15-20 minutes, which wasn't bad. We sat in the inside waiting on a table to free up. Once we were finally seated after 30 mins and someone cleaning the table we received menus to place our orders. There were 5 of us in our party but only 4 of us ate and placed an order. The other person with us does not like soul food and maybe I should've followed their lead this particular day. The food finally arrived at our table but our waitress disappeared. She was not attentive, she didn't come back to ask if we needed anything. We had to ask someone else for a carry out container and other things throughout the visit. Finally, the bill comes and I'm reviewing it. Come to find out this place has already added 18% gratuity to the bill, WHAT!!! How is it okay to add the gratuity first off for a party of 4 then having no clue as to how the servers will perform. A tip is not an entitlement but a privilege. If service is absolutely horrible I will leave a low tip, but to add the gratuity in to mediocre to poor service makes no sense. I see why our waitress was so inattentive because she was going to get 18% gratuity regardless. Not to mention the infestation of gnats in the restaurant. I'm trying to eat my food and swat gnats all at the same time. Utterly ridiculous. I will NEVER return. Plus reading the other reviews service seems to be bad steadily, no refills on beverages, hard cornbread, and screwed up meals. This place never has to worry about getting any more of my money. I gave them two stars because the pork chops were delightful. Full of flavor and fried to perfection. The...

Poor customer service. Possible food poisoning.

I called weeks in advance to reserve seats/tables for a large group of about 30 people on the Saturday (April 19, 2025) before Easter Sunday. I asked if they would be able to accommodate a large group for a 70th birthday celebration on a holiday weekend. The restaurant said ok. I called the day before to confirm and update the reservation to 35 people. They said ok.

Imagine my surprise when I got there at 5:15pm with balloons and some small decorations and the restaurant was packed! There were no seats/tables blocked off for our group. It was like I never spoke to them!

Despite confirming our reservation weeks in advance—and again the day before—we arrived for our 5:30pm (some members of our party arrived as early as 5:00pm) reservation to find that no accommodations had been made for our party size. We waited approximately 45 minutes to be seated (We should have left when we saw that our reservation was completely disregarded!), and it was nearly an hour and a half after our reservation time before food service began. The service throughout the evening was extremely poor and disappointing, especially given the importance of the occasion.

Most concerning, however, is that several members of our group experienced severe gastrointestinal distress (e.g., diarrhea and vomiting) shortly after dining at your establishment—symptoms consistent with food poisoning. This critically impacted our health and well-being.

Given that we spent over $700 that day, at minimum, I expected a sincere apology and a meaningful gesture of goodwill to begin to address this deeply disappointing and harmful experience. When I called the restaurant to speak with someone about this matter, I got the run around and gave up trying to pursue a resolution. I will NEVER dine here again and encourage others not to as well until they improve...

My husband and I decided to go to Urban Soul after hearing the other restaurant (Southern Fires) closed and decided to check it out. Our first indication that this may not be a good experience is when we asked the greeter to get someone to clean the table he sat us at, it was clearly dirty and he actually was insulted that we asked to have it cleaned before we sat to eat. The food finally arrived after a bit of time. My $12.95 meal...sooo disappointing, with two chicken tenders masquerading as full chicken breasts. My husband asked the manager about it and she got an attitude about us even asking her a question--saying do you want it or not, wow. But before the food came the waitress took quite a long time servicing us and it was not that crowded. The waitress walked past several times and on the second time says, oh did you order a drink and still never brought it until we asked the manager who did not take customer service 101 to bring us one. Most people know I am humble and try not to make waves about anything unless I am disappointed or feel disrespected in any way and this was one of those times. Also, as I was walking out and calmly expressing my concern about the level of service the same greeter who sat us said it doesn't matter what you think, we will still be open---again rude and disrespectful and uncalled for...Really, how is this acceptable?!!!! Thank God I remained calm and continued to walk out. I guess I am just puzzled as to why this establishment thinks it’s ok to be rude, supply bad service AND provide mediocre food at best. Does anyone know the owner of this establishment?!!!! I try at all costs to support but attitudes and service make...