deSha's - Cincinnati — Restaurant in Symmes Township

My friend and I try to eat out a couple times a month at various restaurants. I'd heard good things about DeSha's and figured that it would probably be worth the thirty-minute drive so I made reservations for 6:15 through OpenTable. First, it had snowed the week prior and nobody had bothered to plow the parking lot. It was still a nasty, sloppy mess. Inside, however, the restaurant was beautifully decorated for the holidays. It was warm and inviting, not too crowded, and not to busy. We were greeted and seated quickly and our waiter arrived shortly thereafter to take our drink order. I ordered The Gingerbread Man and my friend ordered the Winter Santa-gria. My drink was an Old Fashioned with a "house made gingerbread syrup" except that you couldn't taste any gingerbread notes at all. For an Old Fashioned, it would have been fine but that's not what I ordered. My friend ordered the "Winter Santa-gria" which is basically a cold mulled wine with a coconut rim. She said that it wasn't bad. We ordered the chicken andouille spring rolls as an appetizer but they didn't arrive until just a minute before our main courses. The deep fried spring rolls were still cold inside. My friend ordered the Maker's Mac and Cheese. The cheese was so runny that it dripped steadily from the pasta and the BBQ pork tasted like it came from the frozen section of GFS and was reheated in an aluminum pan- but just barely because everything was lukewarm at best. I ordered the Maryland Crab Cake Sandwich and substituted the mac and cheese for the fries. My mac and cheese faired no better than my friend's. My sandwich was a soft, gooey mess with a soggy bun, waterlogged apple relish, and an overpowering amount of chipotle "aioli." That wasn't aioli. That was a cry for help. All I could taste was that sad sauce as there was easily a quarter cup of it on my sandwich. It's a crabcake, for goodness sake. You should be able to taste the crab. After tasting just a couple bites of our main courses, we decided that this wasn't how we wanted to spend our evening so I asked for the manager and complained. She apologized and comped our meal. We tipped our waiter $20 regardless because he hadn't done anything wrong. DeSha's cancelled our OpenTable reservation at 7:55 (we were enjoying a much better meal in Mariemont by that point), making it so that I couldn't leave a review on that site (which is why I am here). There are better restaurants in Cincinnati at that price point. Seek them out and don't waste...

Good Morning Tina, I am so sorry that I did not respond immediately. I have been out of town and this is the first chance I have had to actually sit down and think about that night.

Most importantly, I would like to thank you Tina for everything you did to make our event absolutely wonderful. You are very good at your job and you made it so easy for those of us on the committee to take care of hosting this event.

The staff you assigned to us were incredible. Natalie, who was working that night made sure she greeted us and let us know if we had any questions to come and see her. And we did😀 !

Matt patiently & cheerfully handled a lot of our beverage orders and I can tell you he didn’t miss a beat while taking care of some very thirsty women.

Most of all kudos to Patricia, who was the lead person for me to speak with. She was so attentive and so good at her job. She smiled the entire time and made sure to help make our event the success it was. We ran her ragged for a while there and she just kept smiling and saying we can do it. You have a treasure in this young woman.

The chef went out of his way to make sure our food was hot, delicious and served when we wanted it served, even after a couple of changes on the time . He was so flexible. The food was amazing and everyone absolutely loved the fish, even people that didn’t eat fish loved it. Also, thank you so much for offering us the opportunity to have the staff cut and plate our cake for us. And it was incredible that you put out boxes & bags after the event to allow us to take the leftovers home..

The venue was perfect. I am so thankful that we got the little extra room to put the food and the cake in. That change made such a difference in how the room flowed.

It was very helpful while we were setting up that Patricia and Natalie had ideas for us on how to arrange things.

Having the band playing in the background was also a nice touch.

I have a feeling though, we were so loud we were probably annoying the folks who were sitting in the levels below us trying to eat their dinners.

Again, thank you for all of your help and efforts you put into making our 50th MND 1974 alumna reunion the success it was. You have a great team.

Kind...

First time customer thanks to Burger week. The "Get a Gripp" burger was THE ONLY highlight!! Upon entering, we were left standing at the entrance without any acknowledgement for at least 5 minutes even though employees were walking right past us. No" one moment please". I had to actually stop someone and ask if it was self seating and then were we asked the formalities of "how many, etc". Once seated, our waitress appeared about 10 minutes later asking if we wanted anything to drink. I asked for a drink menu and water to start. As she's approaching with the menu I hold my hand out to take it and she tossed it on the table and walks away🤔 ok. She wasn't very customer focused and I had to asked her if she had time to answer a few questions because she made us feel very rushed to order. THE GET A GRIPP BURGER IS AMAZING!! Got the burger with a strawberry margarita that was less than but manageable. Time to pay. Here you go Eve. She returns and throws the receipt down on the table to be signed and walks away leaving me again with my hand out. Ok, then enough is enough! Upon leaving, I asked for a manager so I can let them know that Eve may be having a day. Manager Elise ( could be Alisa, Eliza, was kinda loud on the inside)but she introduced herself and I proceed to tell her that first of all I only know Eve's name because I asked her and she cut me off by saying " we don't introduce ourselves" (I'm sorry did you not just walk over to me to and do that exact thing?!?!?) Ok fine, secondly, she seemed like she was in a hurry and tossed the drink menu on the table and walked away while I was trying to ask questions, "Oh, I'm sorry you experienced that" (😑 are you, really?) Ok, she seemed to have more energy and conversation for the bigger party next to us and - " Big parties are time consuming" (🤐 at this point) Thank you for your time Elise, I'll use the restroom and exit your establishment. She did nothing to show she cared anything about what I was talking about so needless to say I will not be returning here! THAT BURGER WAS...