SOHO — Restaurant in Rochester Hills

I would want to give ZERO out of five stars if I could for this restaurant being a food and safety hazard. I ordered the Hwe Dup Bab (Korean Sushi Bowl) and I tasted something really bad like mold in my mouth. My family member tried it too and they tasted the same thing, so we called the waitress over and told her quietly because we wanted to be considerate of their other customers. She didn't apologize when she came back from the kitchen and just told us that they've been serving sushi all day and that there hasn't been a problem. But why would we complain if there wasn't a problem with our food?

We didn't feel comfortable eating here anymore so we decided to go over to the waitress to cancel our other order, which they had been working on for 30 minutes already and it hadn't been finished. However, the manager suddenly appeared and started talking about the raw fish again saying that he hasn't heard anything like this happening in his six years of doing business (wow, that's ONLY six years--so what?). We're not even sure if it was the raw fish or the vegetables that tasted off, but something in there tasted so disgusting that we had to spit it out. It just wasn't edible. I almost vomited.

Anyway, his voice started getting loud because he was getting defensive when we weren't even going to bring up the bad sushi bowl again in the first place. He then told us to leave like he was getting rid of us all of a sudden. He was probably anxious that the other customers would find out that his restaurant served us moldy food. He added that we didn't have to pay for the food so that he could tell us to go again, but obviously we shouldn't have needed to pay for anything because we didn't eat the sushi bowl other than for the two or three initial bites and the other order didn't even come out! Does it take 30+ minutes to make something as easy as kimchi stew? I don't think so.

Still, we left a tip for the waitresses because at least the other two girls had a decent attitude compared to the one girl, but we seriously felt so disappointed and upset by this entire experience. The manager didn't care for what we had to inform him and that was very upsetting. All we wanted was for him to check with his staff to make sure that they aren't using rotten ingredients and serving them to the customers, but apparently he doesn't care about the health and safety conditions of his customers.

I'll be lucky if I don't get some kind of bacterial infection in my stomach from this. If I do, I'll definitely call the City Health Department on them because they are in dire need of some kind of inspection for this.

I can at least try to understand if your food doesn't taste good, but please don't serve people mold!

I now get why most of the customers here are non-Koreans. There are bad rumors circulating about this restaurant and it really makes sense.

A restaurant should exist to make customers happy by providing tasty or at least fresh food. If you can't do that, at least know that how you treat your customers is the most important part of the job because they matter and I'm speaking as someone who is working and building relationships with various types of people every day. If you don't want to interact with customers in a reasonable manner, go do something else that doesn't involve customer...

I don’t normally leave reviews, but I feel compelled to share my recent experience due to how poorly my group and I were treated.

We visited the restaurant as a group of friends and were surprised to be seated separately, even though the restaurant was mostly empty. Wanting to enjoy our meal together, I politely moved two adjacent tables closer so we could sit as a group. Shortly after, a staff member approached us in a highly aggressive and confrontational manner, insisting the tables could not be moved—even though they were right next to each other and we were not disrupting any other diners.

She raised her voice and continued to repeat herself without offering any reasonable explanation, making the situation very uncomfortable. She also wrongly accused another member of our group of disobeying her instructions, even though she had not communicated anything clearly beforehand.

Despite ultimately complying and sitting separately, she returned mid-meal to again express that she didn’t like that we wanted to move the tables — even though we hadn’t. It felt as though we were being singled out and micromanaged in an unwelcoming and unprofessional way.

When the bills came, we were told a 20% gratuity would be automatically applied due to being a “large group.” I explained that we were seated separately and paid separately as two smaller groups — one of four and one of five — and that it didn’t make sense to apply an automatic gratuity in this case. I also expressed that, given the poor customer service and uncomfortable tone throughout our meal, I did not feel a 20% tip was appropriate. The staff member continued to argue, insisting that she relies on tips for her income, and even the owner pressured us by saying it was “unfair” not to tip 20%.

It’s deeply disappointing to be treated with hostility in a setting that should be warm and hospitable. We were respectful guests who simply wanted to sit together, and we were met with rudeness, repeated interruptions, and an unwillingness to accommodate even the most basic request.

Sadly, this experience overshadowed the meal and left us feeling unwelcome and disrespected. I would not return and cannot recommend this restaurant based on the way we were treated.

Also, bathroom...

EDITED REVIEW - So my original review was pretty negative because the server that we had was very slow and not what I would call hospitable (the food was great), However, little did I know that he was also overcharging me by double my bill which I found out from my bank statement. I contacted the restaurant and was told the manager would have to take care of it and they weren't in until after 5pm, so at 6pm I get a call and it's this same server. He apologizes and says he'll call me back shortly. I waited an hour and then drove up to the restaurant because I was out $70 and something didn't seem right. When I arrived I was met with a female hostess, who was very nice but was unable to find my receipt (which seemed odd because there were a lot of receipts that she did find) and also told me that no manager was available to assist. She asked me to go home and she would call to make it right later after their "dinner rush". I refused because at this point I'm not confident that I'm getting anything back. In the end she called the "manager" and was approved to refund me the overcharge (I told them my original bill was $70-$80, they took me at $70, which I think was bold of them for a business that just effectively stole from me and couldn't produce the receipt). The hostess also informed me that I wasn't the only individual that had reported the overcharge issue with that server that night, and my receipt was not the only one that went missing.... odd right?

They kinda tried to make it right, but it was really unprofessional, I really had to stick it out to get my money back. If I had not found the fault in my bank statement, I'd be out $70. I never received any word from management, no phone call, no offer for any full refund or accommodations for my time wasted, just the cash. I will not be back and I warn others to be careful with their credit card statements after dining here because not only do they have an employee seemingly giving themselves a fat tip, they also have management that's impossible to get...