Hot Tomato — Restaurant in Myrtle Beach

My boyfriend and I went to hot tomato last night. We discovered hot tomato a month or two a go and have been coming every Sunday as we love the eggplant parmigiana here. Yesterday the arugula salad we received wasn’t what we expected. The arugula tasted like it had gone bad and when we said something to the bartender (who was very nice), he told the manager about our concerns. After speaking with her he returned to let us know there was nothing he could do. I found it strange that the manager of a restaurant wasn’t interested in the customers and wouldn’t even try to come speak with us or take a look at our food. I thought there must have been some kind of miscommunication. Although she was seemingly avoiding me I eventually got her attention. She immediately brought hostility into the conversation. She accused us of just trying to get our money back. I explained I was not trying to get the appetizer taken off the bill I was just hoping to either have it fixed or get something else. She became verbally aggressive stating “either eat it or leave”. She then continued to threaten to call the police on us if we didn’t leave immediately. My boyfriend and I looked at eachother with shocked expressions, gathered our belongings and began walking out. On the way out I made sure to thank the bartender and give him a tip. As I passsd the manager I heard her on the phone talking to the police saying 2 customers are walking out on their bill. I looked at her confused and said “mam we are not walking out on the bill we are doing what you told us to”. We decided to wait for the police to show up in order to clarify we were not walking out on the bill we were threatened and told to leave. The police were patient with this lady which I commend them for because she was a loose cannon at this point. He asked if we were willing to pay the tab which we immediately agreed to. When he brought us out the bill we noticed she charged us not only for the appetizer we didn’t eat (which we expected but at this point just wanted to go home) but she charged us for our entrees that we didn’t even recieve. I could tell the police officers could see how ridiculous the situation was and how unprofessionally it was handled. This lady was trying to suck every penny she could from us. He said he would go back in and try to get her to take it off the tab which I replied in a joking manner “good luck”. Some time passed and he came out with the food to go and we couldn’t help but laugh at the situation. She made sure the food was made before we left so she could charge us the full bill. I think the police officer believed because this women’s first language was Spanish there maybe was a miscommunication but my boyfriend is fluent and spoke with her in Spanish so that’s not an excuse. I’ve worked in the service industry for 13 years and I have NEVER seen a situation handled so poorly. I understand she didn’t want to lose out on the 14 dollar plate of arugula but her actions made the restaurant lose two loyal locals that have been coming weekly to get appetizers, entrees, and drinks. We always tipped extremely generously and even had built friendships with some of the employees. As we are locals we have heard about this women’s reputation before. She used to work at Vincenzo’s another local Italian restaurant and was fired due to her poor behavior not only to customers but to her staff. We knew she recently started working at hot tomato but I personally didn’t have a bad experience with her (although many people we knew did) so I wanted to give her the benefit of the doubt. I would also like to mention she claimed multiple times she was the owner of the restaurant. From my understanding this is not true she is a manager. I looked through the recent reviews (within the last year as she is fairly new) and saw reviews also speaking on behalf of her rudeness, hostility, and penny pinching. I found one that was very similar to my situation. For the sake of the employees I hope they are able to find better management. If/when they do we will be...

Went here twice on vacation to myrtle beach. Each time there was some issue that was met with friction by management. The overall restaurant had a great vibe and the waitstaff was extremely kind and responsive despite them seeming to be a little short staffed. On our first visit, we sat in and ordered pasta. We noticed that it could use a little salt, not an issue, and added some from the shakers at the table. It wasn’t until we had fully “salted” our meal that we realized something was off. Apparently someone had swapped the salt out with sugar. Upper management said it was because a new girl had helped open and likely mixed the two up. My meal was inedible at that point due to the Alfredo being ridiculously sweet. Only 15% off was offered despite the tab being over $50 and me not being able to eat my main. Who I assume is the manager (Joel) came out to apologize, except he sat down and apologized to the table next to us. Once that table said it was actually my table that had been affected, he glanced over and quickly added us in the apology as an afterthought. The other part of this that rubbed me wrong was Joel made our waitress play middleman. She was extremely apologetic that he would only comp 15% and he made her come out and tell us vs him speaking himself. While we were in the restaurant, we saw how good the pizzas looked and figured we’d give them a second chance the next day. We ordered a cheese and a marg pizza to go. The cheese was amazing, but the marg left a lot to the imagination. I didn’t grab any pics, but it was extremely similar to the other most recent review that management waived off as “a new chef”. We called to try and resolve this issue and were told to bring it back and they would remake it. My partner opted for a cheese this time just to play it safe. Once going back, Joel made a point to say they didn’t mess up and that’s actually how those pizzas are supposed to come. (He went as far as pulling up a google definition that they don’t include sauce even though you can just as easily find one that does include it). After that he said to get the corrected pizza, we had to tip the cooks because “they only made it out of the goodness of their hearts”. I’ve legitimately never been talked down to and treated so poorly by management. I’m extremely disappointed because the location, waitstaff, and food (when it’s right) were great. I also find it really funny that online management acts extremely apologetic and wants to help rectify the situation, but that was so far from our in...

I’ve never had a more baffling dining experience, especially with a party of 2. We entered on a busy night, but nothing crazy, and the host was helping out away from the host stand. The person doing take out orders didn’t want to seat us because he didn’t know the system the host had. We were told three times in 7 minutes that someone would be with us shortly. When the host was available, she let us know it would be a 45 minute wait and then there would only be 15 minutes before they closed; despite the fact that there were at least 3 open tables and no reservations or anyone else waiting.

We were also given the option of sitting at the bar, which had open seats, and where we could also order food right away. After getting menus at the bar, we tried to order food but the bartender told us he couldn’t put in food orders as there were kitchen problems and we’d have to wait at least as long as the host told us, but we could start with drinks.

After finishing our first drink we were ready to close our tab and find somewhere else for food but the bartender was then able to take our order. Food came out in a reasonable amount of time and presentation was great. The bartender redeemed himself and had great service the rest of the evening, even making a stellar local beer recommendation. If not for him, this would be a 1* review.

The part that stood the most was the manager. She was by far the slowest moving person in the bar/restaurant. The place was struggling and she provided no help or hustle. She was behind the bar several times and kept her head down, not even acknowledging customers or wanting to interact with her staff. It was evident the staff were in the weeds and they were doing everything they could to help guests, but they had no support.

It’s disappointing to see a place with such a good, clean set up, great bar, good tasting food, and hardworking staff, struggle so much because of a lack of leadership and systems that result in bad...