Renaissance Harlem — Restaurant in New York

My wife and I are currently reviewing Harlem eateries and historic restaurants. We have been to several so far and 1st things 1st! UTENSILS-NAPKINS-WATER!!! How is it Renaissance Harlem only got the "WATER" part right!? After giving the server our order, 15 mins later my wifes entree comes out first, wait what?.... with someone else's plate?...HOW? I advised the server our food should arrive together but he said it was her plate and sat it in front of her. Bear in mind, at this time we still had no silverware or anything, so we sat there watching her french toast get cold. Not to mention, there were no condiments of any kind whatsoever present on the table, no butter, no syrup, no nothing! After FINALLY getting someone's attention when we were able to ask for utensils to eat the server looked at my wife and says "you don't have a fork? "SERIOUSLY that is the proper response!? After waiting another 5 or so minutes the rest of the food arrived sporadically plate by plate. I had the chicken and waffles, now I am not one to critique food because I'm NOT a food critic, BUT the chicken was basically frozen chicken strips that were NOT thawed properly before being cooked with ZERO FLAVOR!!! The waffles were virtually FLAVORLESS as well, even with syrup (that also arrived cold and late)!!! I have had chicken and waffles LITERALLY all over this country and in other countries as well and NEVER had chicken and waffles this bad...! I also ordered the shrimp and grits. SMH! Can anyone tell me how it is possible to screw up shrimp and grits? Even when I asked for salt and pepper the grits still tasted like they were made with dishwater! The final straw was my wife finding a hair solidly deep fried into/onto her bacon! EEEEEWWWW! HAIRNETS PEOPLE!!!!! The manager removed the bacon from the order and the server removed the chicken and waffles because it was obvious from all the UNEATEN food something was wrong. SO! $93 for plain cold french toast (to quote my wife: didn't even have powdered sugar on it), Denny's style processed seasoned "home fries" (Denny's are better), TERRIBLE shrimp and grits (again, mind blowing how they could mess that up), and a carafe of watered down mimosa... Shout out to another "BISTRO" in Harlem for saving the day, PLUS making my wife a fan of grits...something I have tried to do for 15yrs!!!

DO BETTER...

We were a party of five women and arrived about 6PM. We were seated shortly thereafter. The staff was friendly and our waitress was very helpful. One in the party wanted short ribs and was told it would take two hours to cook. When asked why, the response was, so it would be very tender. When asked why not use a pressure cooker she could not offer a reason. We ordered appetizers and they were very good. When our entrees arrived, some were not hot. Some of our party were not pleased with the portions or taste. I ordered the salmon with baby vegetables. The portions were extremely small and everything was tasteless except the sauce on the plate. The meal needed seasoning and the salmon was overcooked. When the waitress asked how my meal was, I relayed the above to her. She apologized and offered to get me something else. I thanked her and declined. I didn’t want to make a big fuss and more customers were arriving and the place was not that big. My friends and I were starting to feel very rushed. Bus boys were starting to remove our plates with food already on them as we had not even finished our appetizers. Several times we had to tell them not to remove the plates. Then we were told other guests were coming and they needed our table for a reservation for 7:30PM. We responded that our reservation was for 6:30PM and no one told us we had to eat quickly and leave. We asked to speak with the manager who repeated the same and apologized and said we could sit in a waiting area. We told him we were about to order dessert and more drinks which we did. During dessert, again the bus boys came hovering over us and wanting to remove plates with food on it and again we had to tell them we were not finished. When we got our bill, the orders were all mixed up and it had to be done over. We were then escorted to a waiting area in an enclosed outside area. Thankfully our ride was on time. We all agreed not to...

On October 1st 2023 my business partner & I made arrangement with owner Ali to host a Halloween brunch party on 10/28/23. Ali requested that I prepay for a party of 20 in advance to reserve the space and since I was confident that tickets would sell I handed over my credit card with no hesitation. About a week before the event I alerted Ali that no tickets had sold and that we would be canceling the event, he said we should continue promoting though out the week so we did to no avail. I was told to come to the establishment on 10/26- to my surprise I did not receive my refund but Ali gave me a story about his accountant advising him to refund me in check (after I requested he refund my card) and that I would have to wait another 4 days for that to happen (red flag #1). I finally receive the check on November 1st and to my surprise it's less than what was charged to my card (he claimed the credit card fee was removed - 2nd red flag). He then gives me another check with the correct amount that I deposit in the bank 11/2/2023 - I'm told that there is a 7 day hold on the check (3rd red flag). I immediately contacted Ali to make him aware of the hold - no response - a day later 11/3/2023 the bank returned the check due to insufficient funds - Ali and I spoke on the phone briefly and he said he would write me a new check. I called texted and visited the restaurant on 11/4/2023 but no response from Ali - he never returned my call as he said and did not responded to any of my attempts to correspond with him so I now believe he purposely gave me the check to get over on me. Though I love the food I would never support this...