The Court Cafe — Restaurant in Los Angeles

Here's my experience. This is basically an email I sent to one of the owners. The food was spectacular the previous times, today it was horrible! I'm assuming because they were closing at 6pm & we arrived at FOUR!...

We arrived around 4pm, obviously too late for quality service (big mistake), we were told we could only sit where menus were placed, only to be to move once again by a waitress (whom by the way, never checked on our table once) after taking our order. Her order taking, question asking was very condescending in HER "professional" manner I have to assume.

We ordered our drinks immediately, waited about 15 minutes before having to ask for them by the gentleman who took the drink order before the food order travesty. I received my drink. I ordered a Modelo mimosa & wasn't given the remainder of the beer as the previous times I've visited. I immediately went to the front desk addressed the young lady about the issue & she COULDN'T CARE LESS & didn't try to assist only to find out later, when asking for a manager, she appears at out table with an unprofessional, offensive demeanor & attitude. She didn't approach with an a personality to assist nor did she seem to care to address the many issues at hand, therefore, I dismissed her from our table frustrated.

I went to the bar area myself to address my drink issue. Come to find out, the bar tender (Hispanic female) had very nasty "leave me alone" when I approached her about my Modelo mimosa, which turned out to be a Corona, because Modelo wasn't available & I wasn't advised of this matter & that's why I didn't receive the remainder of the beer, because they were being manipulative, instead of honest about what was in stock.

My shrimp & grits comes lukewarm, & definitely not fried hard enough as my previous experience nor seasoned well. My God sister also didn't enjoy her poboy sandwich. Her bread was dry & fish/shrimp texture & flavor wasn't well as our previous experience.

I then asked for a manager, the Hispanic male points to the young Black girl at the front desk. Today was not my first encounter at this location with this young lady having a terrible attitude in my opinion. The last experience with her, I ignored her attitude & assumed it was age. To know she's a so called "manger" is an embarrassment to represent your establishment as a person in leadership. I simply asked to be compensated, not for my meals, but with french fries because my food wasn't good & I had a long drive home. She denied me & offered breakfast potatoes instead. I declined. Shortly after she appears at my table with fresh fries, no apologies, no empathy. She simply dropped the fries on the table, said "here you go" after telling me no moments earlier & walked away.

As I paid for our food she, the "manager" was non verbal, did not say the amount to pay for the bill. I had to ask her, all while staying respectful to all who I encountered as your staff. I submitted your catering form for an event on June 7th about a month ago. My name is ShuRonda Smith, You can disregard the inquiry after today's experience. I no longer will consider your services unfortunately. Lastly, I want you to see my BEFORE replys in your IG comments compared to todays disappointing experience. I will simply attach the screenshots. Thank you for taking time to read my email. Customer service should be priority in your line...

Businesses like this are exhausting. First let me start by saying I’m a Black business owner with multiple locations nationally. I primarily support Black businesses intentionally and I rather address a business directly than going online and writing about my discontent. I tried that at this location but wasn’t allowed to address the manager on-site. Instead the host came over with a piece of receipt papers so I can write a note for the manager to see. This is the same hostess I asked to speak to the manager who immediately paused with hesitation and asked me what my concerns were. She told me to sit down and he would come over then 2 min later she comes to tell me he was not on the premises. The host just so happened to be the second person I spoke to, the first staff told me he was on site before I walked to the host to ask to speak with him. I believe he was in the room because she kept looking at a man as she spoke to me and if he wasn’t there and as the host she knows who is in the building why tell me he would come over. Being manipulative seems to be their approach.

Google the location yourself and come up with your own opinion about where it is and the price point, but hey if it’s good it’s good. I had lunch reservations so I wanted something lite so I ordered the slice of shrimp avocado toast for $22. A little more than I expected but I figured it had to be great and I adjusted to the price. The server informed me that there is an additional 12% service charge on top of the bill and it’s not a gratuity or a tip. I asked my server why the business didn’t just increase pricing because the additional note is off putting and feels manipulative. If your prices are more they are more, charge more so your customers know what they are getting themselves into versus creating a space where a new price point has to be adjusted to once the server points out the note explaining the 12%. Just add you $2-3 increase and prevent this occurrence is what I would have suggested if I were allowed. I imagine this hurts the servers and it’s just not upfront where it should be which is in the price. I have seen this in other restaurants but it never alarmed me. Partly because the prices started reasonably in the first place and the esthetic, location, and service made sense for an increase. This business has none of those basics.

Service, location, and esthetic shows little effort while they demand so much. I won’t go back. I support Black business but this sad example of excellence is offensive and when a customer has a concern a hostess with a receipt paper should never be the response. Disrespect someone else I deserve better and so does the Black community. It’s about the principle with this...

We gave this place a 5 star rating when we came previously. Now, I doubt if we'll ever come back. We came in on 11/10 at around 2:15 and were told that there was a 45 minute wait. We left to head over to the Southern Girl Bakery. We came back about 50 minutes later and still had to wait to be seated. We werent seated until 3:24. Normally, the front of house worker will seat you and tell you that your server will be coming soon. That didn't happen for us. She pointed to a table to tell us where to sit. Our table still had food on it and I had to ask someone to come and wipe the table off. Every other table had drinking water on the table. Ours had none. We had to watch other people that were behind us coming in get served before us while we were forgotten about. No one came to tell us they were serving us for about 15 minutes. Someone walked by and saw me looking around to see who would help us when and said to me that she would help us in a second. 5 minutes later she finally came back with water. We never got her name. We finally got to order drinks and got a Sprite, 2 lemonades, an Orange Sherbert mimosa and Caramel Apple mimosa and then our food. This was about at 3:50. After some time, I looked over and saw what I was sure was my wifes 2 drinks sitting at the bar with people walking and talking around them. I had to get up and go to the front to find our server and remind her that we hadn't gotten our drinks. At 4:11 she then brought our Sprite and lemonades and then asked us if we had gotten the mimosas. She then brought us over the CA mimosa that had started to change colors and the OS mimosa that had ice cream in it that had completely melted and we had to ask for them to be remade. We then waited until 4:45 for our food and then we called it quits. Our daughter was hungry and wondering where the food was and actually started to cry when we said we were leaving because she really wanted to try the strawberry shortcake pancakes. As we were walking out, neither our waitress nor the front of house worker even acknowledged us. Waitress didn't even come and check on us during the wait or see if we needed refills. She stayed in the front area of the restaurant most of the time so I couldn't even see her to remind her that we were waiting. I definitely shouldnt have had to remind her that she never brought our drinks over. We live in Torrance and it's about a 20-30 min drive from our place to here. We wasted gas and time coming here. This was the worst service that I've ever received from a restaurant. Particularly upsetting that my daughter broke down about us leaving. They had a big party in their back room but we still shouldnt have been...