Yook92 — Restaurant in Palisades Park

Visited as a group of 8.

Food: 8/10(taste) / 6/10(rating). I would say quality is definitely on the higher end of Korean BBQ. This is somewhat expected given the price tag. While food is good, it doesn't mean it's an overall positive thing for my overall rating, because being good based on its price tag making it a normal/average thing.

Service: 7/10 (friendly) / 4/10 (experience). Nothing against the services, it was overall a decent experience. The reason behind low score is that the grilling happened elsewhere. I don't know if it is due to group size or something else. A part of experience is someone to grill in front of me, not on a separate table. If it's not in front of me, then it could have been in the kitchen like any other restaurant. I believe price tag tells me it shouldn't be grilled elsewhere. the upcharge is the experience.

Place: 9/10. Neat and clean. The bathroom is meeting my expectation for sure. nothing out of ordinary that stands out as negative.

So here comes my big negative. Parking!!! What's with the valet parking? it's in the same lot, the idea of valet parking is that the closest lot is located elsewhere or distant, therefore, customers would pay a bit extra to avoid the necessary walking. Top end restaurant in major cities where parking isn't available, or hotels where parking is located in deck or underground in a connected building. The restaurant owner picked a place knowing it lacks necessary space. the valet parking guy is just stacking cars very closely. the valet parking, therefore, is servicing the restaurant as his action would allow more customers. Had he not exist, the customers might have dine elsewhere due to lack of parking. Having customers paying for a valet parking right in front of the same lot is ridiculous.

I see whole lot of problem with parking. top concerns are: is he a contractor or an employee of the restaurant. i don't even know to whom I gave my key to. is his operation insured? why is this guy so rude, lack of basic training in service?

Overall: I think it's still worth the visit, but it's nothing special enough that I would visit again. Food is good but expected with its price tag, can easily get similar quality meat elsewhere at this price tag. I didn't get to experience the bbq, so no comment on this specifically. The parking rule and the parking guy ruins the meal before...

I'm bringing awareness to an incident where our friend was wrongly accused of smoking in the bathroom by the manager. I observed the manager mentioning multiple recent incidents, three times specifically, where the fire marshals have been called for similar incidents. He disregarded my concerns about a group of men smoking and vaping outside of the restaurants as being culpable. As an asthmatic, my friends are well aware of my sensitivity to smoke and vape fumes and avoid doing so in any proximity.

If you choose to visit the restaurant, be wary as you may have the police involved for a situation your group had no involvement in. Which is truly unfortunate as the atmosphere and food is good (though pricy), but the possibility of having the authorities called on you is not a risk I want to take again.

Update: Thank you for your response and for being so ableist of my medical condition and dismissive of my concerns. Your presentation of my asthmatic condition and what parts of the story are irrelevant is indicative of your disregard for customer experience and wellbeing. We all stayed to give the authorities the ability to search our belongings because we firmly believed we were being unfairly accused. The vape was not presented to us as evidence in any capacity to address with authorities, interesting its mentioned here. My experience was unpleasant, because I was the one you addressed and was dismissive towards during the ordeal, and this is what I'm choosing to share as this was not expected from the owner, no less. I encourage you to continue your investigation and I hope per your response, that you will treat future patrons with more respect as this courtesy was not extended to us during any part of...

The place serves genuinely good quality meat and the ambience is pleasant, with a clean and spacious interior. Unfortunately, a few critical shortcomings in their service has clouded our perception and I do not think we’ll be dining again.

We never got a sincere apology or recognition for having to sit through a unwarranted fire show on our grill. Our grill started spitting fire from the fat dripping below the fire. Was quite hazardous on multiple occasions, to a point where everyone sitting at the table had to push their chairs back a few feet to put themselves out of range of the spitting hot grease. As upsetting as this was, what was more unsettling was how nonchalant the servers and managers were about it. No apologies, no offer to switch tables (after 2nd time it happened, at our table only), and who appeared to be the manager so casually tried to brush it off and have us continue dining. Oh and btw, our meat was burnt. For a place so new, quite a suspect way to manage what was so visibly an awful guest experience.

The forced valet parking is either a front for a petty money grab or a misfit feature of a desire to be seen as ”luxury.” The valet attendant took our car and parked it 2 feet away from where we dropped it off, in one of the 20 open spots that were open in the lot right in front of the restaurant. Was hard to understand why I was being forced to pay $3-4 for something I could have done with zero lift.

We found small pieces of hair in our food. Not going to make a big deal out of this because sure, it happens (and this pales in comparison to the fire show). But it is emblematic of how rushed and hectic the...