Tempe Eats Food Hall & Bar — Restaurant in Tempe

My roommates and I gave this place(actually, we gave the Yogis inside) three chances. I have ordered the same thing (a large Beef Teriyaki bowl with extra rice and added avocado) all three times. The first time I came, I ordered during the soft launch. The meal came in a styrofoam to-go box with entirely too much rice and tiny bits of what was essentially left over meat bits. As this was during my lunch break, I had no where to go since I had spent the entirety of my lunch waiting for the meal to be made in the first place. Imagine my devastation when finally faced with a meal after a long day of work to see the desecration of a meal that held so much comfort. The second time I decided to order here, I’d heard that the cooks had been retrained and customer feedback had been taken into consideration. I figured, hey, I only tried it once, it can only go up from here right? Mayhaps soft launch jitters had gotten the best of them. I was genuinely pleasantly surprised with the quality of my food this second time around! The food was hot, the package was correct, my meal didn’t look like food scraps. I was happy that the turnaround seemed genuine and was looking forward to coming back. And yet, like Sisyphus pushing his boulder, I am destined to remain in a cycle of hellish disappointment as the quality of this Yogis, too, goes down hill. Tonight, actually, an hour ago as of writing this, I convinced my poor roommates out of ordering Chipotle, a decision I now wish I could go back and change, and they joined me on my quest to try this mythical Yogis once again, as we had all had previous questionable experiences but were so optimistically hopeful to try again. Maybe the fact that this complex, once marketed as a hub for young people to hang out, was almost completely empty on a Friday night in Tempe, was the red herring we so blindly missed upon entering.

Opening my meal upon arriving home, ecstatic like a child on Christmas morning, my enthusiasm quickly diminished. My precious Large Beef Teriyaki Bowl with Extra Rice and Added Avocado…. Was actually a small… with no avocado in sight… no problem, right? Except… with all the added upgrades, a single meal comes out to about $18-$20. And there so, begins my horrid night. After calling and chatting with a nice gentleman about What we could do, I decided to come in to get my meal remade. As I waited for my replacement, my roommate, an unfortunate victim who was part of my order, informed me that their chicken katsu was infact, entirely inedible due to the tough, rubbery, almost plastic feel of the meat itself. As we live in the neighborhood, they agreed to bring their meal in as well while I would bring up a potential partial refund to the manager on shift for the night, who, up until that point, had been incredibly pleasant with me and apologetic about my initial experience that night.

…until…I brought up wanting a partial refund. It was like a switch had been flipped, like a bale of hay catching fire, our interaction immediately became heated and hostile on her part. I was offering my phone to her so she could see my initial order, as I assumed she would’ve liked to see the order to confirm I wasn’t lying. I asked for a partial refund, as I had already had my personal meal remade. My roommate is autistic, and I knew they wouldn’t want to eat the same meal after their experience with the first one, so theres no point in taking a new plate. This manager, who I didn’t even catch the name of, immediately raised her voiced and told me I could either take the new plate, or talk to the owner of the establishment, as all she could do for me was replace my meal. Since when have managers not been able to do more then comp a meal? Why was the first resort jumping to making me talk to the OWNER? I didn’t even ask for a manager in the first place. With tensions rising, both my roommates arrived with the second meal in hand, and suddenly it was all smiles, comped drinks(one of which had gone entirely flat)and offered seats.

TLDR; go to...

So unfortunately, I hate to do this but I have to leave an honest review. My family and I were really looking forward to this place opening and so excited to try it. We've been looking for a good go-to in the neighborhood. Turns out, this place will not be it. I place an online order through their website directly. I showed up to the drive-thru window to pick it up at the exact time that I was supposed to. After approximately 15 people walked in and out of the kitchen, which is in direct eyesight to the drive-thru window, and purposely averted their eyes after making eye contact with me or did not even look, finally a young woman came to the window and asked us what we were there for. Explained that I was waiting on my order and she said she'll check on it and left. Please keep in mind as well that there is no doorbell or anything that a customer can do to alert anyone that they are present at the drive-thru. After not receiving my order I called the restaurant approximately 10 minutes later. The woman who answered the phone was extremely kind and apologetic and said she would be right there. The woman came immediately to the window found out what I was waiting on and said she would check on it. Unfortunately additional time passed without receiving my order so when a third woman finally brought me the completion of my order, I did ask if there was some contact information for the owner. I fully understand that this is newer establishment, in this location at least, and wanted to give the information about my experience to the owner because I feel that it's very important that they know how their business is being run and the impact that it has on customers. A fourth woman came to the window. She opened the window and said how are you, either she did not know or she did not care why I was there to speak with her. I told her that I was waiting for contact information for the owner and her response was I am the owner. Nothing else. Just silence. I explained to her what had happened her response was that that's good feedback. The look on her face during my explanation was as if I was a Karen who had nothing better to do than complain. In fact all of my other reviews are fairly positive because I don't like to leave complaints and I don't like to reflect negatively on a business because I understand that there are one-off situations. The owner truly had no empathy or concern for my experience as a customer, there was no attempt to make amends, no kindness or personalization... Instead, I was made to feel as if I was being an inconvenience to her, when I was the one who paid for a service that they did not receive in a timely manner and was ignored, and she made me feel as if she did not care at all. From the looks on her face to the way that she spoke to me, it was very clear that she was not interested in my feedback. I was kind and soft-spoken, I did not address her in any sort of way that could be perceived as aggressively or confrontationally. She made it a point to be as brief as possible and say no more words than absolutely necessary to advised me that the feedback was good and essentially made me feel as if it was unnecessary to relay this to her. I'm honestly shocked because it doesn't matter if it's been a McDonald's or a high-end restaurant, I have never been made to feel or directly treated as insignificantly as my experience with her. Approx 45 minutes later I got an impersonal text from the business with a copy and paste apology.

To be fair, the food was the normal quality from Yogis and the drink was ok. The real place at this eatery shines is in the interior design and the atmosphere. However, due to this experience, we simply won't be enjoying that. There are other places that have always treated us well and have incredible service and atmosphere, such as Fate Brewing Company a couple doors down, that we will be more than happy to continue...

Gives off a “we don’t want you to eat here, leave” vibe. Oh man, where do I start. Long read so sit down. I work over at the LA fitness behind them have seen the owners coming in promoting this place non stop. My clients are always asking me about it, but I haven’t been there until last night. I decided to take my family out for dinner so we can all try this cool new place. Big mistake. They were having a fundraiser for something. Okay. Our bad. But, we were seated……probably 15 minutes goes by, and we finally figured most everything out when a waitress finally asked if we’d been helped. I said no, but I think I got it and was about to order the drinks. 2 Fanta for the kids, lemonade for the Mrs, and water for myself. The waitress said it because it was so busy don’t worry about, she’ll bring it out. That was appreciated. Because it was a new place/concept I ordered a few items to try. I got a pizza for the kids, one sushi roll, mini sliders, Mexican street corn, and voodoo pasta for myself, and a vegetable noodle bowls for my wife. Beignets for dessert. Food didn’t take long. But immediately after paying I informed the waitress that accidentally ordered it to go but want it for here (as the whole family was sitting in a booth), she said okay no problem happens all the time. Food comes out in bags, in containers. It’s the wrong order. Food comes back again in bags, and boxes. I untie the bags and begin passing the food around. There’s no plates (for kids pizza). Wife goes to get plates, comes back. No utensils. Get up to get utensils. Okay. Time to eat. The vegetable bowls literally only had two carrots, and a few pieces of cabbage. The rest was noodles and rice. This really upset me. The street corn was okay, but too much lime made it very sour. I couldn’t finish it. Everything else was good though. I enjoyed the pasta (we joked they put all the vegetables in my pasta) Kids liked the pizza. The sushi roll was good too. Skimped on the ginger and wasabi. Didn’t have enough. The beignets felt like naan that was fried and sprinkled with sugar. Kids liked it though. It gives off a “we don’t want you to eat here, leave, go home” vibe. It is not a restaurant atmosphere. You got a bar, random (drunk) people singing karaoke and all the things that come with that. Not a place to sit down and enjoy a meal. And it was hot. The room temperature was way too hot. A lot of people fanning themselves and dabbing their heads to wipe of the sweat. Add in spicy food and it won’t be a pretty site if you’re on a date. It just seems confused. The staff is the best thing about that place and it’s a shame because they were working so hard. I’m leaving some buffer for this review since there was some kind of fundraiser going on. But probably best to close the restaurant portion if you’re doing something like this.

I rarely take my family out for dinner, so when I do, I want it to be a great experience for them. I had to apologize to them last night for that. I won’t be going back, but at least now i can tell my clients and regulars at the gym what I think when...