ShoeBooties Cafe

Okinawa P

Cute little restaurant. We all ordered different meals and sides. We enjoyed everything.

Tim Allmond

Wow! Should have been a 3 star review until the waitress destroyed it. (See the end. Long review) We try to enjoy local small town dining whenever we travel. I very seldom have a bad experience because I look at reviews before we visit. This time we got burned. ShoeBooties has an average of 4.3. I should have read them more closely. We intentionally came around 1:10 to avoid the lunch crowd. We were seated pretty quickly. At about 1:15 we ordered drinks. At 1:30 we ordered appetizers and our sandwiches. 32 minutes later we got our bang bang shrimp and baked crab, artichoke & spinach dip. FYI- neither were spectacular and half the chips were soft with oil. At 2:20 (50 minutes after ordering) we got our sandwiches. I love Cubans so I ordered it. Bad choice. The bread had burned bread chunks in it from whatever they cooked before it and it did not have mustard which is clearly part of the sandwich. It is clearly listed on the menu (see photo). I had to ask a waitress other than ours for the mustard. Like we did for most of the refills. No one finished their food and it was not worth taking home. The other three members of our group all said their sandwiches were nothing like the menu described including missing ingredients. And the lobster bisque was basically bisque with chunks of tasteless fake lobster chunks. While eating we watched two couples walk out after waiting. Everyone in our group works and believes in rewarding service. We noticed the sign in the booth that said a $3.99 customer service charge would be included if you did not pay cash. When we got our checks they were accurate. I asked if the charge was on my bill and the waitress said no. My friend, who is normally a heavy tipper decided that neither the service nor food were worth tipping after the price we paid. He walked off and I was still in the booth. I clearly heard our waitress standing right behind me complain that he did not tip and said " I don't know if it was the food or what. You can't please them all" I did leave a 15% tip. I now wish I had not. After we all walked out, our waitress (the name on our bill is Shannon but I would not know because she never introduced herself) came outside and actually confronted my brother about not leaving a tip. I could not believe she actually followed us out to the street. This was after all of us thanked them before we left. She basically said she was working a big group in the back room and she did the best she could. My wife was so upset, she wanted to go back inside. We decided it was not worth it. While I appreciate the fact that she had a large group, the management should have been better prepared to deal with those in the main dining room. I actually think the manager brought us our food. It sure wasn't our waitress. If you are not a local and you appreciate good food and service, steer clear of ShoeBooties in Murphy, NC.

Chad Thomasson

Hopefully the owner will see this and take note. We are not super regular customers, but we eat there every 2-3 months and expect and look forward to an above average experience as well as food quality. We chose to go on Father’s Day for a nice lunch. We called ahead to reserve a 12:30pm table for four. When we were seated at approximately 12:25pm, we sat for quite a few minutes until the hostess took our drink order. She then came back and took our food order. She was working hard to seat people and try to do what she could. Actually running in her high heels through the dining area to try and cover everything. She brought out my soup and the kids muffins fairly soon. As we approached an hour of sitting there, I caught the attention of the only waitress working the floor. Before I could even ask, she said “your food is coming up, I’m the only one here”. It was well over an hour until we received our lunch order. My son had ordered the burger and asked for it to be plain. It came out with all the treatments of Mayo, onions, etc. When we caught the hostess’s attention, we told her that the burger was ordered plain. She said she would send it through again. I asked if it could be less than an hour this time because he had to get to work. She said she would rush it through the kitchen. When it came back out, he took about three bites (as seen in the attached photo) it was basically raw. He didn’t eat it past that point. My turkey sandwich was crusty on top and soggy on the bottom. I ate it because I was hungry. I never got a drink refill during this time, my glass sat with nothing but ice for the last hour of my meal. Finally, after over an hour and a half, I had to go up front and ask if I could pay so we could leave. The hostess pulled up our order and as I handed her my card, I told her that the second burger was raw. There was no emotion or apology, she just ran the card. I am not a super picky patron, and I am usually a very generous tipper. The service level was far below expectations and no kind of apology or anything about our experience. Instead of running herself to death to continue to seat other patrons, she should have had some direction to slow the influx of new diners so the kitchen and wait-staff to catch up what was already seated. The hostess was doing all she could do. No repercussions should befall her as she was very industrious in trying to fill seats. I understand we are in a different world, post Covid, but you should only allow what you have the capacity to serve. A simple apology could have went a ways to diffuse an otherwise terrible dining experience. It just felt like they were frustrated and any kind of attention to the lack of service would have made it worse for them.

Jared H (Jlive)

I'm not from this area so I had never heard of this place. The restaurant is well kept. It's not a huge place but nice and cozy. It seems a little dated but in a good way. When it was time for a refill of my tea they brought out a carafe which was a nice touch.