Yamato Japanese Steakhouse

Reviews 4

BR

Brett Cook

Ive been here twice and both time its been a satisfying experience. The food is quite good, the show is good, and the service, at least once Im at my table, is very good. There are some minor caveats, most of which explains the negative reviews Ive read. First, people are applying normal "wait time" periods to a habachi grill. It doesnt work that way. At a habachi grill you are going to wait much longer unless you just get lucky. This is practically necessary because everyone gets their own, effectively private, chef. So be patient, the chef will work his way around to your table and take his time with you too. If youre in the mood to get in and get out in under an hour, a habachi restaurant, any of them, is just not what you need. That said the wait at Yamato was reasonable by habachi grill standards. Both times I was a little disappointed in the host when I walked in. Hes not rude or anything, but he seems entirely disinterested. No expression on his face or in his voice, extremely straightforward, etc. Fortunately this attitude is not shared by the other employees. The waitresses seem to be beautiful, friendly and quick, the chefs are funny and put on a good show. So just let the host go, it gets better after that. Hopefully I just caught him on a couple bad days. A minor word on the decor. The front of the building is extremely non-descript and some of the lights on their Yamato sign were not working. On the inside, things get much better with a highly spacious, industrial-style, accented with plenty of Japanese paraphernalia. However, I noticed that they really need to clean the glass on their giant kimono display. Im not picky about these things, but the glass was very obviously smeared, which I could see 10 meters away from the table. So a little Windex would go a long way there. If they would spend one day and a little money I would happily upgrade the restaurant to "very good" decor. Hopefully they have by the time you get there. With regard to the food, I was very satisfied. The quantity is incredibly massive. Each meal (apparently) comes with a decent sized salad, miso soup, an entree that includes vegetables, fried rice and whatever you order specifically, then sherbet ice cream. I ordered a chicken and steak combination, but despite that already massive amount of food, the chef gave me extra shrimp for free anyway. The only issue I had with the food was that the rice was a bit burnt in some places. This is somewhat understandable though because the chef made various symbols (a heart in my case) when preparing it for the show, so I suspect the rice on the bottom probably got a little burnt in the process. But I stress it was only slightly burnt and still very good. None of the other food had these issues. I recommend that you ignore the majority of the bad reviews here as, looking over them, they seem to relate to the wait times, and as I explained above, you cant apply normal standards of waiting to a habachi restaurant. So if youve got an hour and a half or longer to spare and want a great Japanese steak, give this place a try.

NH

Nhat Nguyen

AUG 19, 2012 I have eaten here often enough to consider myself a regular; the cooks even recognize my face when I come in. We had a reservation at 7:30. When the time came around, the hostess told us they were clearing two tables for us. Well, after thirty minutes of off-and-on questioning with the unpleasant hostess on why it was taking so long, we were all squeezed into ONE tablet, despite having a reservation for two. After some polite complaining, they eventually agreed to let us have two tables. We sit at the table for AN HOUR before our soup and salads even arrive, which puts us at 9:00 by this point. We were still being polite with our complaints of having to wait so long and what not. Then the refills stopped coming for our drinks, to the point where the COOK had to go to the back to get us all refills. Protein for our orders were also missing from the cooks cart. The cook that we had was very nice and apologetic because he was aware we had been waiting quite a while, which turned out to be a lot more than what we got from the indifferent manager once we finally snapped and couldnt take the horrible service anymore. We didnt finish paying until 10:45; OVER THREE HOURS later after our reservation. This wasnt the first time either. The previous time we went there as a group, we made a reservation for three tables. It was an hour and a half before we even started getting food. I dont know why the quality of service has gone down so drastically, which is why this review was so heartbreaking for me to post after three excellent years of dining there. I wont be back anytime soon, and I would advise others to not even bother making a reservation as they obviously dont hold themselves accountable to them. ***UPDATE*** DEC 30, 2012 We recently decided to give this place another chance. While the food was still good, you can see theyre trying to cut back a bit and this is obvious in the quality of the shrimp. The show took a while to start again, and you can clearly see the disorganization between the staff members. They just dont seem to be working as one unit. Management really needs some improvement.

A

A Private User

My family and I are longtime patrons and as frequent as practical guests of the Northwest Expressway location in Oklahoma City. We appropriately and gladly refer friends to that location. We will do so for the foreseeable future, and we have always been thanked for our recommendation. We were very excited about the new location in Norman on I-35 Service Road. We were, until we visited. Our hostess was distracted, apathetic and made zero effort to conceal it. We were served tea and water in greasy-spoon style plastic tumblers. Our waitress disappeared for inappropriately long periods. Our hibachi cook put on no show (one big flame and some silly looking spatula clanging). Our hibachi cook showed no interest in entertaining us. We were served our ticket before we were asked if we wanted drinks (we didn’t) or green tea ice cream (I did). In west Norman, there are quite a few people who have meager expectations for a $55 meal for two. They might satisfy enough of them to have a go at it with such modest standards. A $55 meal out is a rare treat for my wife and me. Although I am not the type to try to squeeze maximum value out of every dime I spend, this particular evening was FAR beneath my personal standards. Please congratulate your Northwest Expressway crew for always exceeding our expectations and for feeding and entertaining my family so well in the past. If the service we got in Norman meets franchise standards, the God bless you but count us out.

A

A Private User

My wife & I decided to take our 13y.o. daughter and some friends here for her birthday. "Hey lets try something new." We made reservations about a week ahead of time for 12-14 people at 6:30 on a Friday night. We even verified the reservation twice. We get there on time after searching and searching for a parking spot. Were all excited. The hostess was not all that friendly. We waited 45 mins on our 6:30 reservation to actually sit down at the one uncleaned grill they crammed all twelve of us at, but that gave me a good view of the dirty floors between 2 grills. Our waiter, Michael, was absolutely terrible. All our glasses stayed empty and we barely saw his unfriendly self. Our chef had to get his attention several times, because even he noticed it. Thankfully we had a humerous and entertaining skilled chef. The sushi I ordered came out halfway through my meal. The restaurant itself was very hot. We had to ask another waiter to get the ice cream that comes with the meal. We had to wait a very long time to get our check, which had a tip already added to it. I understand the gratituity figured in, but our waiter didnt deserve a penny. Our chef and our food was great and the prices were not all that bad for the food and entertainment (for a Japanese Steak house), but because of the customer service from the rest of the staff, we are very disappointed and will never go back, and we will be sure to recommend that our friends NOT go there.