Southern Ground Coffee Shop — Restaurant in Mount Olive

I think the reason this has so many stars is because it’s the “best” in the town, not because it’s legitimately good. It’s what my spouse and I call “small town 4 stars”, meaning that in real-world stars it’s a 1-2 stars, at best. If you like diabetic coma levels of sweetness and subpar baked goods maybe this is the place for you!

My review is as follows:

Their regular drip coffee:

Hazelnut but no mention of hazelnut. I don’t know if it’s cross-contamination due to not thoroughly washing their drip or if they’re using hazelnut coffee as regular coffee and not disclosing that. I’m not allergic to hazelnuts but they absolutely eat a hole in my stomach.

Muffins:

Blueberry, chocolate, cinnamon: These are nothing special. Legit, walk over to the grocery store next door and get better quality from their bakery. These muffins are DENSE! They’re not light or fluffy with golden tops. The muffins remind me of Little Debbie muffins in a box. They taste like they use canola oil in them and you can taste it especially well in the chocolate muffin which lends an ‘off’ taste. They’re also kind of wet and sticky/soggy due to being wrapped in Saran Wrap.

Frappes:

Meme’s Frappe: Undrinkably sweet! My daughter and my husband both took 1 sip of this and said it was ridiculously over-sweetened. I declined to taste, I believe them.

Banana Split frappe: Also disgustingly sweet, AND instead of using REAL bananas, they use banana flavored syrup. 🤢 Who even does that?! It tastes like fake banana candy. Ew! Like, come on! It’s not difficult to use real bananas, nor is it a stretch to expect that there would be real bananas in it! They’re right next to a grocery store, grab a bunch of real banana, freeze the leftover ones at the end of the day. Heck, maybe make real banana bread? One that actually tastes good?

Both frappes had 1 sip taken from each of my kids and then my kids threw them out. Kids! My teenage son who has the most ultimate sweet tooth and is currently a walking human garbage disposal threw his out! His was the fake-banana one, the face he made! He was confused!

Lastly, the bathroom had no paper towels and the whole store smelled like a melange of glade plug-ins and stereo-typical “southern” candles. It was off-putting. I expected to be greeted by the smells of coffee and baked goods but was instead assaulted by Bath and Bodyworks meets Yankee Candle. There was no coffee smell to be had, which is crazy because they’re brewing hazelnut coffee! So… yeah, small town 4...

So many drink choices! I got the dirty chai latte and it was delicious. Super clean and spacious! We were the only customers when we went but the dining room could hold 50 people no problem. And there’s an additional meeting room available. Loved the books on the table for kids to read! I also loved the artwork that was for sale. There were also t shirts, jewelry, and flower bouquets for sale. Bathrooms were clean and well stocked and had a changing table. Too bad we just stopped by on our road trip- I would love...

We need a small space for a meeting and Southern Ground stepped up big time. They cleared a room, helped us maintain privacy, plus provided coffee and snacks. They were phenomenal to work with from the moment I asked if we could use their conference room. It was a super easy, large impact experience. The staff was amazing and my team was able to arrive early and get some work done. Huge thank you to them for welcoming us with such southern...