Kiu Japanese Restaurant — Restaurant in Markham

Most authentic Japanese flavors in the Toronto and surrounding area! Delicious dishes carefully crafted with meticulous TLC and detail carving every dish into the memory of your taste buds 👌🏾. However, the price does lean over towards the higher end of premium pricing ($$$).

CHICKEN KARAAGE - $9 Didnt expect much on first bite on this one but it tastes way better than it looks! It's not just any fried chicken! The meat inside the deep fried batter was so soft and juicy, it was a mouth watering appetizer to try for sure! Would definitely order this again!

THE SUSHI Ordered the salmon, shrimp, scallop and eel and all four just melted in your mouth in flavors. The fish roe is also very fresh and delicious. I have to say the sushi is my favorite of all the things tried at kiu. I could just eat sushi here and be happy with that! The rice is also super soft, but a word of caution... Handle your sushi with delicate care. A little too much force with your chopstick could tear apart the delicately put together piece of art, be gentle with it!

THE RAMEN - $13 Known for their ramen, It was a dish I had to try. Overall the ramen isn't super epicly amazing, I would say it's "good" and I would order it again but there are definitely more delicious and interesting things on the menu to engage the taste buds. The noodles had a good texture, not too soft or too hard, just the right texture. The spicy shio ramen and the regular ramen were good. I'm not a big spicy eater and I was able to eat the spicy shio ramen just fine, the spice gives it just a bit of a kick not enough to overpower the other ingredients in the bowl. The char siu was also good but there were only two thin pieces. I loved the double boiled egg, but with they had the whole egg and not just half making me feel like I got jipped for the other delicious half.

MISO BLACK COD - $22 Though a little pricey this is definitely one of my favorite dishes here. I absolutely loved the pieces of black cod just flaking off. Delicious flavors, amazing taste, just love this dish!

SAKE STEAM CLAMS - $14 This dish was more about the presentation upon serving than the actual flavor. The clams are deliciously cooked in sake and fire right at the table and the "soup-sauce" is something to slurp up after devouring the clams. Liked it but not my favorite here at kiu.

Overall, I really liked kiu and I would definitely go back ... For the fresh sushi!!! Among the millions of Japanese restaurants and fusion restaurants, this one definitely stands out and is worth a visit to at least try it once. It will take a little hit on the wallet but I think it's worth the try! It is...

Kiu is under new management. All reviews prior to Oct 2024 should be disregarded.

Food is mediocre for a restaurant that presents itself as high end. They aren't as good as the former Kiu menu. The food seems confused. Sashimi is thinner and lower quality than before the management change. Tummy felt unwell after eating.

I ordered a yuzu pepper grilled chicken dish for my toddler and told the waiter it was for a baby. The waiter did not warn us the dish was super spicy even without the seasoned skin so we had to order a second main course for her. When we asked about the spice level the waiter had no idea about the menu and needed to ask the kitchen.

Service, wait staff, hostess, kitchen, and manager were a chaotic disaster. Only 4 out of 7 courses arrived to the table. We were at the restaurant for over 2 hours and waited for an hour with nothing arriving and nobody updating on the situation. We were lucky already because we got some food since we were at the first table. The other customers left with no food after several hours and were still waiting for a discounted bill. Hostess asked us to be ready to vacate the table for the next booking...we would love to if you would bring us the food so we can leave.

After inquiring with multiple staff and the manager many times (this took an hour) they said food in 5 minutes. I needed to pack it to leave because my baby had been sitting for 2 hours and is crying now. They still had delays and I had to ask multiple times to figure out the bill and resolution. Got my final food items as take out, it was not worth the wait it was like garbage. They packed melting ice cream with a tart 🙄.

Honestly they are lucky customers did not get up and leave without paying and nobody could blame us after getting no food and service. As I said we got some food. Many tables that arrived after had no food at all. The table beside us only got the first appetizer and then tried to get the bill to leave after waiting over an hour for nothing.

The restaurant needs to do less social media promotions and collabs and work on hiring more staff...

If you're looking at this review, lucky you. Please do your utmost to AVIOD eating here. Take some time to look at all the Google reviews, only the bad reviews are liked and agreed. Possibly liked by angry costumer and former Kiu members...

There was a renovation happened inside the restaurant, few months ago. Basically all the old crew member including the kitchen staffs and the Foh, even the OG members who worked more than five years here were ALL fired within a single weeks. That's a really a big L for the restaurant owner for doing it in such an immoral, dirty way.

And I totally doubt the new crew, like all of them, having ANY culinary experience. Sure they're Japanese, but they're definitely not providing the high standard of hygienic level that we all expected from a Japanese crew. Ingredients are often found rotten, expired, but still they will do the 'cut off the bad part' trick and still serve the food, ignoring how bacteria might actually already grown in the part that still look rather better. We really have to close our eyes and serve them sometimes cause the ingredient supply was always tight.

Service is going to be five stars tho, coz that's the only thing they'll provide, which they know. The food is prettily performed in plate, but the size, the taste, the quality would never fail to disappoint customers. Tonkotsu Ramen weren't actually Tonkotsu but just frozen chicken soup, but settling in a price more expensive than KinTon Ramen, like how dare you lol.

The portions. It wasn't that small due to any like food design, but simply budget cut. Hate the way how they trying to get money out of each item with this move.

The production line is a joke. Their full member team could barely handle a slightly busier weekday, just don't even mention any special occasion like the Valentine. You can actually wait an hour for just one item.

Their standard won't ever meet the price they sell. Caution: don't get fooled by the foodies they hired to promote them in insta, TikTok or...