Red Sea Restaurant

I miss you. Great Ethiopian food. Lots of good times playing on stage.

I’ve never tried the food here, but I have been here for live music.
The acoustics are… alright. Especially in the main dining room, where a small band can literally mow over the small crowd with loud music. I saw a guitar-​flute duet rattle the windows with their folksy madness.
Down below, it feels like a cave, with stone walls that makes some bands sound a little tinny… But on both floors it’s all loud.
The last time I was here, I ordered a Guinness, and got a blank stare from the bartender, who handed me a can of Guinness. That’s fine, some places just don’t have it on tap. But when I requested a glass, he said there were none available. He eventually brought one over to the table where I was sitting, so it made it all better.
What I like about this place is that they’re willing to try new things. Compared to similar venues, this is pretty rare. One night a few years back featured a Slam Poetry show. Not my cup of tea anymore, but it was fun.

The Red Sea is a nice place to go if you are looking for Ethiopian food. After eating at another Ethiopian restaurant I had a taste for more and decided to look up information on other restaurants and so I found myself at the Red Sea.
The food was full of flavor like I expected and for dinner I had wat with lamb. It tasted wonderful. Each bite that I took I enjoy the experience of the flavor that exploded into my mouth. My experience in Ethiopian food is not that great, so you could say my taste for it is fresh and undeveloped, but still so far, I have enjoyed the flavorful treat that Red Sea has offered me.

I’ve only been here for the music downstairs and I enjoyed it very much. A friend of mine is from Malawi and several of her friends were there the night we went. I think I was one of the few non-​African folks there, and that was really cool for me to be a part of. Everyone was super nice and the music was really good.

The Red Sea restaurant gets kind of lost in The Loop/​U City area. I think people just forget about it, and it doesn’t get very good buzz. This place has been around forever and I have no idea how. First of all, this place offers no ambiance whatsoever. White walls, white tablecloths, plain dishes, boring, boring, boring. Also, the wait service the night I was there was horrible. Our waiter was rude, boring (sensing a trend here) and was incredibly slow. The restaurant was pretty empty and it took way too long for our food to reach the table. Once it did, however, it wasn’t that bad. I read in an earlier review that the lentil sides were good; I have to agree. My chicken, however, was dry and flavorless. The bread here is delicious, though, but who comes to an Ethiopian restaurant for bread? I can’t say that I recommend this place. Side note: I’ve also been to a rock show (f you could call it that) at The Red Sea a couple of years ago. Their «venue» is in the creepy basement of the restaurant and looks like a set from Buffy; I swear people sacrificed virgins there at some point. Also the sound was awful and since the «venue» is tiny it was so loud and the band was right on top of the audience. Bad times.

Slowest service ever led my group to conclude that this place is actually a drug front. I would provide times, but you would think I was exaggerating. We were the only people there. Maybe they fell asleep? No apology or excuse was offered.

I desperately wish I could give this place more stars. I *love* Ethiopian food, and as far as I know, this is the only Ethiopian place in the St Louis area, so I had really high hopes.
I went with some friends for my birthday, so I was hoping for great food and maybe a cool atmosphere. Well, the restaurant is shockingly run down. It’s right smack in the middle of a really vibrant area, I would have expected more than white walls and plastic tablecloths. Oddly enough, the plant next to our table was wearing an Arby’s name tag. That really didn’t help with the ambiance.
On to the food… It wasn’t bad. I know people joke about how Ethiopian food is a grain of rice on a plate, but really, Ethiopian cuisine is really vibrant and tasty. (It reminds me a little of Indian food, what with the heavy reliance on stews and lentils, but the seasonings and flavors are completely different) The entrees came out in those oval-​shaped dishes, just like in cheap Indian restaurants. The injera was pretty good. Not really noteworthy, but since it effectively a combination side dish and utensil, it doesn’t really need to be.
The real stand-​out parts of the meal though were the couple of lentil-​based side dishes. Holy crap, they were delicious. I don’t remember much about our entrees, but I remember those. The red lentil one especially.
Unrelated to the restaurant itself, I also want to mention that our waitress had a beautiful accent, and was drop-​dead gorgeous. Models would kill for her cheekbones.
I will probably go again, since I regularly get cravings for Ethiopian food, but I so wish that the restaurant itself were nicer. If it could really be a cultural experience as well as food, I would drive into the city for it all the time!