柳七爷麻辣小龙虾 Spicy Uncle

I ordered the seafood hotpot for two. This pot has a huge load of different seafood. It also comes with a small side dish and a bowl of noodle, which means this dish alone is more than enough for two people.

To be honest, the ingredients are not fresh. You can tell they are all frozen ones. Maybe this is what it’s supposed to be like. But I personally do prefer fresh ones. The taste is ok, it’s just like you are having a seafood hotpot.

The service and the environment are good.

Like the soup base, started less Spicy at the beginning and continue to reach crazy until the end.
Ordered a 88$ seafood package for two and a jug or beer for 10$. Everything was great.

My friend and I came here a few days ago and ordered the Seafood Hotpot for 2 after seeing a promo for 20% off on social media.

I will start off by saying I don't usually review restaurants but felt the need to. I gave the restaurant 3/5, not because of the food or the service, but the way they appeared to operate their business.

So here are the goods:

The food was great! There's plenty of food for two people, probably could've fed 3 people. There was a wide variety of seafood - crawfish, shrimp, mussels, crab and clams. It came with this noodle dish which was super tasty with the sauce at the bottom and a side of this spicy garlicky paste, which you had to mix altogether. It wasn't too spicy for me as a spice lover. But I love the garlic touch to it! And it was made with thick rice noodles which is probably the best kind of noodles ? The hotpot also came with unlimited refills of mussels.

Service was good as well. Servers came by multiple times to check-in with us and refilled our soup and water as needed.

Here's the bad:

I went to Spicy Uncle after finding a promo for 20% off on the seafood hotpot, which runs from early to late December. I read a review that the 20% promo wasn't acknowledged so I asked them before we ordered. They said the 20% off was effective last week but this week there was 10% off plus a lotus and seaweed appetizer and the noodles. So we ended up staying and ordering anyways because of the perks. But it would have been nice if they updated their promo on social media if it changes on a weekly basis. Because it seemed kind of deceiving. They were advertising for something that was no longer valid.

When we went to pay, the lady at the cash register gave us our bill. I looked at it, double checking the 10% discount was incorporated, but didn't see any indication of it so I asked if it was included. And she said if we paid in cash we will get the 10% off. Again, it was very deceiving because the server omitted this when we originally asked about the discount. Luckily my friend had enough in cash. The lady took the money and counted and told us we had the right amount but still needed 10% for tips. And that didn't sit too well with me. As a former waitress, I know that tips are based on service and as a patron, you tip based on the service you received. I was going to tip a little more in the first place but restaurants shouldn't tell customers to pay an X% of tips. If they do, that should be communicated to customers either verbally or on the menu. So I asked her again if this bill included the 10% discount. I was thinking, "Why do we need to pay an additional 10% for tips if this hadn't included the 10% discount in the first place?" At the same time the waitress who served us walked up to her and told her we knew about the 10% off." This was when the lady at the cash register apologized and issued us a new bill with 10% off. So it seemed like if we didn't catch it, we would've had to pay regular price when we really came for the promo.

It's such a pity because the food was great! But it felt like they were being dishonest and deceiving on many levels. I'm not sure if this is how their business is run or because of lack of training or other causes but I'm sorry to say, despite the delicious food, I won't be returning for awhile unless things change.