Sota Soul — Restaurant in Saint Paul

Upon viewing and visiting first time Looking for Soul Food was very disappointing. As visiting from Missouri I know real soul food. Asking the owner if he ate certain things his reply was no! Instead of going into details and saying I know about it or my parents have experience with it. But none of that was said. He did tell us he handles the meat and his wife handles the sides. It took for us to walk away and leave for the maintenance worker to tell us to come back he would provide us with samples and tell us that his parents are from down south. Upon going back in we were provided with samples and explained that again coming from Missouri we are just looking for some nice food. Besides street tacos or street corn. And the meaning of do you know anything about food would have been better off replying by Saying I don’t eat that but I do have experience with it. Plus size about Sota Soul Food it’s real Catfish being served and even labeled correctly. The service that the Maintenance men provided from communication with understanding and going above and beyond was awesome. Greens were well seasoned even including onions but could have been cooked longer. Yams were different but seems to good. Red beans and Rice definitely has some sort of meat. Mac and Cheese looked to be oven made but no yellow color for cheese nor eggs original color of elbow noodles. However take into consideration that I wanted to try this place but was turned off cause he didn’t know anything about what I was asking. But giving the sauce size samples I would like to give them a fair opportunity...

I saw a video on TikTok about this place, and decided to give it a try. I’m truly convinced that not all black folks know what good soul food tastes like; or the 1’s in the Midwest.

For starters, they need to work on their welcoming of customers; male behind the counter was very “dry”- if u know, u know. I ordered the soul food plate with fried wings, rice & gravy; and greens- HORRIBLE!!!! Rice was sticky like, with the most unpleasant taste of gravy on top. The greens had ZERO taste(cum on black ppl, SEASON your greens)!!! The chicken wings had a breading that was falling off the chicken, and the seasoning was undesirable. Ppl always say I’m picky when it comes to food(because I know how REAL good food tastes like), so I had 2 different ppl taste it; both spit it out. Family & friends have been encouraging me for years to open a spot, show these folks what REAL soul food should taste like; after this I’m strongly considering it. Needless to say, I will never, ever, ever return. Sorry, not sorry- it...

Ordered from door dash, food was hot and nicely packaged. The portions on everything were very generous. The smothered chicken was awesome, fall off the bone tender, different from others I've had but I thought it was great The wings I got crispy and they were good with some hot sauce but just ok on their own. The yams were amazing imo, not overly sweet like a lot that I've had but still sweet enough that they could be a dessert. The greens were delicious, and my greens had plenty of meet in them, no bones. Cornbread was great, it was nice and warm still idk if that was from the other food or if it was just freshly baked but that was rly nice. The only thing I didn't like was the Mac and cheese, it was rly Herby and sagey, it had lots of flavor which I would generally say is a good thing but Idk I just prefer my Mac and cheese to...