Jessie Bell's Restaurant — Restaurant in Kinston

As a 1st time customer to Jessie Bells I did not enjoy my experience. Coming in,there was no order ...no line.... I didn’t know who was taking the orders and people coming in after were walking up to the cashier and ordering while some people are ordering with the cook/server. After finally asking who was taking orders the male(cook/server) said he can take my order but order drinks with the female(cashier) As Me and my family are ordering she’s yelling across to us telling us not to order. When my sister said “ I’m sorry he said it was ok to order” The cashier then gets upset rolls her eyes and begins speaking about us to an obvious regular customer. At this point i wanted to leave but my mother really wanted to try it because of all the great things she heard. So I’m up next paying for my food and she makes sure that she informs us that this was the last of the mac n cheese and she wasn’t making anymore. I’m thinking ok thats fine I already ordered mine and paid for it. Not knowing I had to wait for my chicken to cook(which was fine). She gives me my drink and I go sit down to wait. My sister orders and then my mother( who was the only one who got her food upfront) so we are all waiting and then after literally 15 mins i go to find out whats going on. I see ppl coming in after i ordered (and paid) getting mac n cheese and I’m thinking it’s cool cause my plate should be made already.... NOPE.... I then saw the cashier giving one customer extra extra mac n cheese... This is when i asked the cook/server was my family’s plates with mac n cheese made and he says no and that’s all we have so if we run out you may have to choose something else... Uh no sir I won’t i said because i already paid for my food.....everyone coming in after should have to choose something else. He then makes our plates but our chicken still was not ready and literally at this point its been 25 mins...... We got there at 4p and left out at 5p waiting mainly for my food when i planned to dine in. The food was great and homemade but. CUSTOMER SERVICE...

My man is a soul food lover, so when I spotted this spot on TikTok, I knew we had to check it out. Since it was a holiday weekend, we called ahead and were told they’d be open until 5:30—or until they sold out. That definitely piqued my interest!

I ordered the beef tips and rice with cabbage and green beans, paired with an Arnold Palmer. He went for the pork ribs with mac and cheese and potato salad, plus a sweet tea. We tried to get the peach cobbler for dessert, but unfortunately, they were out.

But here’s the sweet part—after we got our food, one of the staff members came out and surprised us with a small portion of peach cobbler from the very end of the pan. She said it wasn’t enough to sell as a full serving, but she wanted us to at least have a taste. I was more than happy with that—he only got a small bite because it ended up being my favorite!

The rib sauce had a little kick to it, which might be perfect for some, but we both have pretty low spice tolerance. The green beans were a bit on the bland side, but everything else was flavorful and delicious. On top of that, the service was warm and thoughtful. We’ll definitely be back when we’re in...

This use to be our favorite place to go eat soul food until tonight. It's a one hour round trip for us but the food was so good we didn't mind. We made the one hour trip tonight and realized that we were overcharged and missing items from our order. After calling to inform them of the mishap. She advised me to remind her the next time I'm in Kinston and she would make the missing items for us. Umm...so what about the over charge? Not feeling confident that we would be remembered and given a refund we made another hour trip. We were given our piping hot missing items (pork chops) to go with our now cold meals. And a refund for the dinner that we never ordered (cornish hens). We didn't even get so much as a "we're very sorry for our mistake." Nevertheless, we're on our way home to microwave our dinners and we should be FINALLY eating by 8:30pm. To say that this was our last time eating here is an understatement. My advice to the owners is to get the young girl off the front lines. She's trying to go to fast and always making mistakes. And a course in good customer service wouldn't hurt. I would give less than one...