Social52 Kitchen & Craft Bar — Restaurant in Richmond

We visited Social 52 late last summer, and I've been meaning to write this review. Our server, Brooke, was great — but we were completely blown away by the food.

It's not that the dishes were overly complex or intricately inventive; there were no savory foams or dishes plated to look like a rain forest or something. They weren't even fancy. It's the fact that each dish was made to perfection for what it was. Take my wedge salad, for example -- a really simple dish that's hard to screw up but manages to be ho-hum at most places. Here, the iceberg wedge was served very chilled (as it should be) and the bacon was perfectly cooked. Our oven-baked meatballs were among the best we've ever had, and I've tried polpette all over Italy. The bruschetta was solid, too — again, a dish that's hard to screw up but is rarely perfect. Even the burger was top-notch.

My point is that everything was on point, and that's very rare. You might find the greatest seared scallops on earth at a seaside restaurant in Spain, but that same restaurant might serve bread that's not fresh or a salad that lacks oomph. Maybe we got lucky, or maybe we just ordered the right things, but every single dish we ate at Social 52 was made to perfection.

I walked back to the kitchen after our meal to thank the chefs and found two completely unassuming young dudes. They were super nice, and stoked that we enjoyed the meal. I left laughing to myself at the thought that I've eaten on four continents (and often paid too much money for the privilege) and one of the most on-point and well-executed meals I've ever had was cooked by these two random dudes in Richmond, Virginia, quietly doing their thing in a little kitchen, raising the bar for their competition, and killing it when it comes to...

Yeah so we were told we'd have a wait of 15-20 minutes. Looked around, saw about 2 or 3 tables open and cleaned already. We went to the bar to wait. 25 minutes pass and we see the hostess has been chatting it up with a group of girls she obviously was friends with the whole time, now even more empty tables, YET NO ONE BEING SEATED. We remembered the guys who walked in right before us so we noticed them waiting at the bar too still, we see the hostess finally decide to walk around and she notices a table open that was literally open the moment we walked in..... had been available/open to seat customers for half an hour at this point and she finally decides to seat someone there? Really? AND WAIT - THERES MORE - 😱Still open tables and she decides to sit down at one of the open tables and gets on her cell phone. She was having a full on conversation talking on her cell - at the table she should've been seating US at considering we were next in line and had waited an entire HOUR at this point. NEVER going here again. Walked out right past her to leave and she finally sends the "text" to let us know our table is ready because we just realized she completely forgot that we were even there. She was too busy chatting it up with her friends and talking on the phone to notice. Social 52, you need to hire a better hostess because this is the worst experience I've ever had at a bar in richmond. We just wanted some brunch. Is that so...

I am pleased with our experience here. They took our group of 11 with 15 minutes notice after our reservations elsewhere fell through. Some of the food (shrimp and grits and sausage and gravy) were overcooked. The food was a bit under seasoned. The breakfast biscuit had no sign of hot honey and we ordered more than one. Should be drizzled over the chicken not added to the biscuit, it drowns out the taste. The atmosphere was a perfect brunch spot, drinks were good with unique flavors and names. All of the food was presented well (shrimp and grits were a bit watery and didn’t present well). Biscuits were hard and some burnt but the flavor was good and we could tell they were from scratch. Lemonade is Minute Maid. For the price it was worth it but I would just hope for more attention to these very unique dishes. There is a flavor explosion in the menu description when reading but it doesn’t always translate to the cooked food. I would go again for drinks and to taste non breakfast food, but not likely since there are so many other amazing food places in Richmond. Having a large party sometimes sets the tone for service. I understand the difficulty that comes with giving us superb service, but I expect a certain level. Our server seemed annoyed and preoccupied. She didn’t check on us and we frequently had to bye for her attention to have simple requests filled for our table (condiments, salt, missing...