So I used to love going to steel cactus solely for the vibe and rooftop bar, especially in the warmer months. The atmosphere has always been laid back and not so "collegey" as other bars which I loved.
Recently, a group of us decided to get drinks there before getting ready for a wedding event. This was earlier in the day around noon. This is the time we first encountered a not so nice hostess. She was very stand offish but we continued to the rooftop. The bartender up there was very attentive and did a wonderful job. We just had basic mimosas which were alright and bloody Marys which were below average. The sun was pretty intense that day so a lot of our friends wanted to move out of the sun downstairs. We had to go get one of our phones fixed at the apple store and called it a day and left, but when the phone took longer than expected we decided to go back into SC but on the regular restaurant level. Now mind you, at this point in the day there was maybe one to two full tables of people, that's it. It was DEAD. We wanted to get more drinks but there wasn't enough seats clustered together at the bar so we asked this hostess if we could just sit at the table because clearly none were being used. We realized (as she so rudely explained) that tables were for people who are eating, but Since there were no other customers we didn't see a problem. I have never met a hostess who was so blatantly rude for no good reason seeing we were very nice and understanding while talking to her. With angry sighs, multiple eye rolls, and an attitude she basically shrugged us off and told us to do what we wanted. We ended up standing at a high table by the bar in the corner to where we were greeted with more rude eye rolls from one of the waitresses. But guess what...it didn't even get busy to where we were hindering other customers eating.
Other than that bad experience, I've always had an okay time at steel cactus. Their food is okay, I definitely wouldn't choose it as a place to get Mexican food.