Niku Niku AYCE BBQ — Restaurant in Hamilton

Just had dinner at Niku Niku AYCE BBQ I've been waiting since last November excitedly for this restaurant to open. I have to say, it was unfortunately not the best experience.

First I will get out of the way, the staff is great, everyone was nice, helpful, and polite. The atmosphere of the restaurant is also good, a good separation between the tables, it didn't feel too tight or too close to anyone.

I will go over the positives first. The quality of the meats seemed great, all of the beef cuts we had, as well as the shrimp and pork, all good quality. The sides were great, especially the marinated bean sprouts. The bibimbap, while not traditional (no crispy rice) was also very good in my opinion, one of the standouts for me. An okay selection of sauces and spices, although there were no labels to tell what they were, other than the salt and pepper.

Unfortunately now I have to go over the negatives. The "flavours" on the meat are completely lost during cooking. It looks like none of the meat is seasoned or marinated ahead of time. they are portioned out, and then sauce is poured on top. This also led to some of the cuts being kind of tough. Also, when you put it on the grill, it is only one the one side, and has not permeated the meat at all. I have been to other Korean BBQ style places and the meat seems to always be marinated fully, so I'm not sure if the other places do it wrong, and this is the traditional way?

In the end, the meat was all very bland until you dipped it in the sauce, but I could barely taste the sweet soy, or garlic flavours on any of them, even if the sauces tasted good before cooking. The only one that tasted how it was described were the black pepper cuts.

We also ordered the cheese corn, and it was strange, it didn't really taste like cheese and had no cheese pull to it. The chicken wings tasted good, but they were far too greasy.

Overall, I probably would give them awhile before I returned, hoping this was all soft-open jitters, and will give them time to hopefully improve...

Myself and a friend went for AYCE dinner at 8pm on a Thursday. We were seated immediately. We put in an order immediately as we knew the last call would be at 9:30pm. There must have been some issue with tickets because we saw all the line cooks standing around for a while and suddenly got a large influx of tickets. We didn't receive anything until 30 minutes in. When we mentioned this to the server, they just said "oh yes, we'll give you extra time, no problem.". The manager shortly after came by to let everyone know it was last call at 9:30 and we were not given any extra time. They also did not let us get melona popsicles after last call, so we had to get them while we were still eating meats because everything came out late. By the time we got to them they were melted so we just left em there. A couple odd and easily fixable issues through standard customer service that was clearly neglected.

I also found there to be a lack of marinades on the meats. The sweet soy, and the garlic meats just have a single squirt. Not nearly enough to actually impact flavour, so everything ended up tasting the same. I asked for some of the marinade on the side to at least dip our own stuff, and they said no as they have soya sauce and cumin seasoning on the table. The meats are good quality, and the sides were good, but without proper amounts of marinade to meat ratio it was a bland meal.

Overall, I wouldn't go back until they get more experienced with customer service, and properly marinate their stuff. Cute space though with good music and decor. It has the potential to be the prime spot for jbbq downtown if they improve the service and food.. I'd check it out in maybe a year to see if it improves but don't plan to visit again any time soon as there are more reliable options for AYCE kbbq...

Updated for dinner: Good selection of mostly quality meats and dishes. There were only two dessert options though. Another positive for me is that the meat options are not chili marinated. The value for money is decent but again the atmosphere is amazing as is the service. Would recommend the venue for social outings.

Lunch review: Was first customer to walk in. Told that the AYCE section of their restaurant is unavailable until dinner section which starts at 4pm. They also do not accept reservations for the AYCE during the soft launch period.

I sat down at a booth table which was pretty comfortable. The Atmosphere was also good, and the music was not too loud.

I ordered an unagi bento ($20.99), which does not come with miso soup. Took approximately 10-15 minutes to come out. Portion sizing is mediocre. Did not come with miso soup. Eggs were cold and the egg white was a bit runny. Unagi was tough to cut through with chopsticks and oversauced and sweet. Other side dishes were alright but were obviously also cold. Taste was alright but not exceptional. The bento lacks a certain balance between the hot and cold dishes and for the time waited and pricing, I would not order this specific dish again.

To end off with a positive not the customer service was excellent.

P.S credit card payments will also incur an additional 2.4% (I think)

Will potentially return to check out AYCE in the near future and will update review...