Bourbon Raw — Restaurant in Louisville

I stopped in here on Friday March 23rd, 2018 with a couple of business colleagues. We were enjoying the atmosphere of 4th Street Live and decided to give Bourbon Raw a try as it appeared to be an enjoyable place to visit. Our waiter was friendly and polite, though he did seem a little green with his menu and bourbon knowledge. We ordered oysters to start and they were actually pretty good. Then we ordered our meals, 2 of us ordered the Seafood Boil and 1 ordered a salad. We weren't in any kind of hurry, so even though the food was taking longer than expected we didn't mind too much. In fact, it was the waiter who first mentioned that our food was running long and that it should arrive in another 5-10 minutes. Then after 10 minutes he brought out a goat cheese appetizer for us to snack on and said our food would actually be another 10-15. Now the Seafood Boil consisted of an 8oz Lobster Tail, Crab Legs, Shrimp, Mussels, Corn, Redskin Potatoes, and Andouille Sausage (sounds great right?!), so we weren't looking to fill up on some goat cheese appetizer. We politely sent it back and said just bring our food when its ready. Finally, after being seated for roughly an hour and fifteen minutes, our food arrived.... and with it came major disappointment. The lobster and shrimp were rubber (to the point where they could have bounced off the floor). The crab legs were the tips (where you had more shell than meat; supposedly a 1/4 lb), the corn on the cob was cold to the touch, and there was literally one single half a sliver of Andouille sausage and two quarter cuts of redskin potatoes. The makeup of this boil was so appalling we actually asked to have a manager come visit our table before we even took our first bite. A gentleman stating he was the manager came to our table and explained to us that that was how the bowl was typically made up; but with more potatoes. He said he would be back with more potatoes but never returned. When the waiter stopped back by to check how our meals were, we had been able to identify how terrible the meal actually was with the rubber seafood and cold to the touch corn on the cob. We again asked to see a manager but to no avail. After about 5 minutes of waiting my colleague decided to go to the manager himself and walked the dish back to the kitchen, at which point he asked the expo to touch the corn. After the expo manager explained that he could not just walk into kitchen, she touched the corn and noticed it was indeed cold to the touch. She asked what he wanted her to do and he handed her the bowl and said "take it, I'm done with it". Meanwhile, I had sent back my boil with no more than one bite taken from the 8oz lobster tail (the crown jewel of the dish) as it was absolutely inedible. With no further communication from the management team, they sent the waiter back out with the bill and had him deliver the message that they would comp half of our meal for our troubles. The point here was not to get our meals comp'ed, but rather to enjoy a nice dinner on Friday night. But, after waiting a hour to be sold "dead" food, that to my suspicion was sitting under a heat lamp for a lengthy period of time, one would expect the management team take responsibility for the poor quality of the food, acknowledge the disservice, and take responsibility for dropping the ball. None of that happened.... and I fully suspect that they sold the food knowing it was going to be a bad meal, and with full intentions of only comping 50% so they could save face on the food cost. When you see Bourbon Raw on the south end of 4th Street Live, turn around and run... run away as...

My wife and myself, as well as my best friend and her partner had a terrible experience. The first issue is that we waited at least 45 minutes until we got our drinks. We gave them the benefit of the doubt, because my best friend and I have both waited tables, and it was a holiday: the cups brought to one of our guests and was filthy and had to ask for a new one, we were not refilled with water, cups were not removed from the table, and we waited another 10-15 minutes to be able to put in our appetizers. The appetizers were all delicious. However, the food in general is overpriced for the quality. The salads were not cleaned properly, we were served ALL vein lettuce. The Seviche didn’t even have salt or cilantro, yet was overpowered by jalapeños to the point you could barely taste the teaspoon of seafood in it. Not to mention the tortilla chips that were served with it were store bought, not fresh. Once we received our main courses, which was 35-45 min later, and still incorrect, we were then told that they ran out of the sides we had originally ordered. My wife and myself have been to several, upscale restaurants, across Louisville, and this was by far the worst experience we’ve had yet. My Salmon was dry, my wife was given a New York strip instead of a Rib Eye, and tried to convince us that it was a Rib Eye. The steak was HALF fat. Two of us at the table ordered has brown casserole, one was over salted and wet, and the other way dry and had no seasoning, not even salt. Same thing happened with the macaroni and cheese; one was dry and the other was fine. There is no consistency in the food or service. We will try again in a few months and pray that it was just the holiday pressure or a bad cook who needs to...

I'm only giving Bourbon Raw one star, because I can't give it negative stars! If you want your food thrown at you or your order totally disregarded and or forgotten, with terrible service, this is definitely where you should go! We went in with a group of 7 and from the beginning we were treated as if we were disturbing the employees play time. Our waitress was rude from the beginning and acted as if taking our order was nothing but a big problem. I ordered an appetizer which was never delivered, even after everyone else in my party had been served. When it was brought to her attention, she actually yelled across the room and wanted to know, what was missing. She finally offered to bring it to me, very disrespectfully. I politely declined at that point because her attitude was awful. A gentleman in our party ordered the dry rub ribs and they were terrible. The ribs were very dry, actually boiled with some dry seasoning dumped on top. For the costs of the food you would think they would at least make it palatable and at the very least, bring you your order. Then to add insult to injury they automatically add 20% gratuity, so the waitress (?) received a tip for being rude, obnoxious and wasting our evening when we could have gone somewhere that would have appreciated our patronage and helped us have an enjoyable evening. If you want good food and an enjoyable atmosphere I suggest you steer clear of Bourbon Raw. RUN don't walk away...