Mikaku Izakaya Toronto — Restaurant in Toronto

I was excited to try this restaurant after seeing its 4.5/5 rating, but unfortunately it fell short of my expectations. We decided to dine here since Nome Izakaya was closed today. The restaurant was quite empty when we arrived around 7 pm, but quickly filled up after we were seated. The waitress was very friendly and provided good service.

For our meal, we ordered the spicy creamy udon, sliced pork belly seared (buta), beef tartare bowl on rice, and chicken karaage. The spicy creamy udon was flavorful and creamy, just as promised. You could taste the layers of the dish, starting with fried pork belly (similar to bacon) layered with vegetables, whole garlic cloves, and cream. However, I found the dish a bit too heavy on umami flavor, which leads me to believe that it may contain added MSG. One downside was the whole garlic cloves, which were a bit unpleasant and could be better with sliced garlic.

The beef tartare rice dish, unfortunately, was unsatisfactory. I was expecting a simple dish with just beef tartare, an egg, and a little sauce to bind it together. However, I received a large portion of box salad and gochuchang sauce. The gochuchang overpowered the dish, and I could barely taste the beef tartare. I think a lighter hand with the gochuchang would greatly improve the dish.

The chicken karaage had a nice texture, and you could taste the aromatics in the marinade. However, the plate was half-filled with salad, which was a bit excessive for a side dish. While the presentation was attractive, the amount of salad was unnecessary, and I was able to make a full plate of salad from the leftovers from the buta and karaage alone.

The buta dish was the most disappointing of all. It arrived when we had already finished everything else, and I was hoping they had forgotten about my order. Unfortunately, the dish was extremely charred and had an overwhelming perfume of burnt flavor. The char was likely due to incomplete combustion of the gas, caused by holding the torch too close to the pork belly. The smell was nauseating and made it almost too difficult to eat.

Overall, the dining experience was decent but could use some improvement. I appreciated the friendly service and the creative dishes, but the execution of some dishes could...

Yet another so called "Japanese Spot" KOREANIZED. What a joke. I go thinking this place is totally truly Authentic and Japanese and yet again most of everything on the menu is oddly koreanized. Just because you have the most Sake variety in the GTA doesnt make you actuall Japanese. You think the Japanese or Japanese restaurateurs would ever Korean-ify there cuisine? Never. There cuisine is phenomenal and they dont have all these odd tasting soup like dishes. The true Japanese would cringe at this place and how its so called fusion korean japanese koreanized. Japanese and Korean cuisine just dont mix in my opinion. Japanese food is actually phenomenal unique refined clean and very tasty. That "moving dry fish skin" on top of there dishes is absolutely gross and I nearly yacked just at the smell of it. Korean food man is it ever ODD. Yuck I honestly find Korean food to be extremely odd, not tasty, and missing alot. You enter this place and there are no windows and feels like youre in a jail. The place is also quite small. Very pricey. The korean server is sweet nice and all BUT theyre just not on the ball or interactive enough and a major language and understanding barrier. The Extra large 2L ASAHI is a ripoff at $40. Should not be more than $30 for something that cost max $12-$14. They are serviing edimame without even sea salt sprinkled on top. All in all I dont think I would go back. Very overpriced and not worth it. The ambience is decent though. Something different...

I literally just returned home from having a very late night dinner here.

This is the 2nd time I have been here and both times have been great. This time however, the service was beyond amazing.

I arrived with 5 other people and it was already around 1:15 am, knowing that they close at 2:30 am, we took a chance. When we go there, it was a full house, so no seats were available, and the wait would be basically until the restaurant closed.

As we were about to leave, i was already reversing the car, one of the workers there ran out and told us to wait. I really should have gotten her name, but she was wearing a red and white dress/shirt with black pants/tights. She told us if we still wanted to stay, there was a table leaving and that we can order first. She told us she will bring out the menu and we can start picking what we wanted. She came back out a few minutes later and took our orders, this was outside still and it was pretty chilly out.

Once we got our table, everything was amazing, service, the food. Just amazing. I would definitely go back and recommend this to everyone. I honestly never had service like this before, she really went above an beyond. I really do regret not getting her name, but if she see's this and remembers us, I hope to get a message with the name, so that next time I am there, I can personally...