Booker's Restaurant & Bar — Restaurant in Philadelphia

Unfortunately, I only do reviews when the experience is less than satisfactory. Let’s start by saying my man made reservations for Valentine’s Day after seeing this restaurant on FOX29. I was hoping for SOULFOOD but that night the restaurant was trying to go for a fine dining experience. Anywho, He was forced to place a deposit otherwise our table wouldn’t be guaranteed. He decided to pay for the whole meal(with tip included)days before Valentines. Now the night of our date, the hostess could not find our reservations and just took our word and seated us. The spot we sat was awkward and I wasn’t really aliened with the table but not a big deal. The small small menu was on an even smaller index card that was originally ignored because of the size. Our rude waitress had to direct us to the menu card. (I’ll post a picture.) The menu contained a holiday style option. 2 soups and a salad for the appetizers. 5 entrée options and 3 dessert. Could have been better in my opinion. The staff was mainly melanated. We had the only white waitress. Seemingly she’d never waited tables before. Absolutely no mannerisms! She had 5/6 tables besides us and it was tight to maneuver around the small dining area. Saying that she hardly came to our table. We only had 1 roll up, so we had asked for a second after ordering our drinks/food. She came back with 1 beer, no hot tea, no roll up. Said nothing turned around and took the next tables orders. I didn’t get my hot tea until after I received my entree. Only because the owner walked around and my date said something. Let me also say there were food runners so our waitress never came back to our table. (Except one other time) We had to catch her to ask for desserts. Only for her to tell us to give her minute. Every other wait staff were absolutely amazing. The staff members collecting our plates and running our food were meeting our service needs in a timely manner. Our waitress seemly just did not want to serve us. When she did come back after collecting our dessert to go because we were sitting waiting for so long, she placed our dessert on the FLOOR!!! It was bagged but I didn’t understand why she would just give it to us in our hands. Disrespectful. FOOD: I would give the food a D+. I order the lobster soup. It wasn’t hot. More like lukewarm and got cold fast, then stiffened up. Next I had the ribeye and lobster. The lobster were fried and it was pretty good. I wouldn’t get it again but my steak was HORRIBLE. I asked for a medium. It was well done and dry!!! Btw, the steak was huge. Huge and dry. Everyone knows that’s something you have to get right. But my daughter likes it over cooked so she ate it the next day with gravy. I wouldn’t go back because of all the misfortunes not worth the gamble. Lastly, good luck...

Where do I begin with this establishment? SMH!!! Ugh!!! 🤢🤢Starting with us seating ourselves outdoors we waited patiently without any menus or greeting from anyone for a while, to the point my daughter had to remind them we were there. Finally, our server comes over introduced herself, she was polite but strangely enough it seemed unauthentic and very much forced but ok that’s not the worst. The food comes out- we ordered lobster Mac & cheese that was unflavored, shrimps were overcooked, and don’t get me started on the cheese looking like melted wax🤢 It was the worst Mac n cheese I’ve ever experienced. The buffalo cauliflower bites were drenched in a very overpowering hot sauce which was unbearable to eat & they were a little mushy- and generally I’m all about the spice but these seem as if they were sitting in that sauce for days. The fried fish Swai bites were fried pretty good, but the flavor of whatever sauce they use was unpleasant, the bun was stale and when I put the sandwich to my mouth to take a bite- the bread had a smell that told me something about the sandwich wasn’t fresh- took one bite and pushed the plate to the side. Furthermore, my sister’s burger came out undercooked & pink in the middle to be exact. My daughter’s “crab cake” sandwich was🤢, the crabmeat was very mushy with the consistency of like oatmeal that set out for a little while- my daughter bit into it and almost immediately spit it out into her napkin. She wasn’t able to bare the taste or consistency. To say the least, we left unhappy, still hungry, and baffled by what was presented to us for dinner. Of course, I complained to the manager & assured him that I would be writing this review b/c of their terrible service and VERY bad tasting food, bad/old products, and unflavored food. The manager listened to my complaint, never apologized, walked off to come back approx. 5-10 min later, hand me the bill of $45 and walked off. Not one single apology, but he did remove a few items. At that point, we just wanted to leave. We frequent many restaurants in the city, this is truly UNACCEPTABLE. Patronizing any business with poor service and/or low quality food is never an option for me. I’ll NEVER return. I’ll never recommend this restaurant and I’ll be curious to know how long this establishment will last with this sort of service. To be honest, Bookers dinner wasn’t worth $2. Horrible, horrible dine in experience, do better Bookers! People are spending their hard earned money with you’ll- this...

Been here quite a few times over the years. Decided to have my brothers bday dinner on Jan 17 2025. When making the reservation of 5 it asked if it was for a special occasion and I chose birthday. We get there and was seated. Two of us ordered burgers bc we couldn't get the cat fish fried instead of blackened. One ordered the burger medium and the other medium well. The manager brought the burgers out and obnoxiously asked who ordered the medium burger and gave it to the person that ordered medium and then gave me the burger that was medium well and walked away. When I bit into my burger I had the medium and my other guest had the medium well. The other person was fine, but since mine was basically rare on the inside and I ordered medium well I didn't want a rare burger. The manager saw me trying to get his attention but ignored me for about 5 minutes. I finally was able to get his attention and told him the issue. He was clearly upset as he didn't apologize nor offered anything to correct it. When my server came back to check on us and he noticed I didn't have my food he asked what happened when I told he he asked if I told the manager I sd yes. He then asked if I wanted anything else. At that point I said no bc I took a while for all of us to get our meal and by this time my table was almost done their meal so I told him no I didn't want anything. When the able was being cleared I asked for the check, and then walked to ask the manager if they do anythjng for birthdays as when I made the reservation I stated this was for a birthday. He sd oh yea we can bring a cake. I sd a whole cake he sd no a slice for the bday person. I sd ok, and sd nevermind as we were paying the check. He sd I cam send it out to go. I sd ok. We paid the check and waited and they never sent the cake so we left. The manager maybe needs to take a hospitality class as he clearly doesn't know how or didn't want to provide a great customer service experience. I also witnessed him at another table bc their was hair on their plate when it was brought to them. And the same face he made when I told him about my rare burger was the same face he gave them. Sad that we were just a non-black establishment for a bday dinner a week prior with 15 people and our service was much better. If I return I will come for HH and sit at the bar bc I would rather spend my money on dinner with my family at a place that can atleast act like they appreciate...