SUSHIKATO HINZAN NISEKO ~Crab&Wagyu~ — Restaurant in Kutchan

My husband and I really wanted to love this restaurant, however, as the previous poor reviews mentioned, our Zen Bliss experience at ¥100,000 per person, was a big letdown. The prestigious white truffles promised on the menu prior to our reservations were replaced with the less expensive black truffles. The coveted nodoguro fish, also printed on the menu the night of our dinner, was not provided. There were tiny bits of shell in our matsuba crab dish as well. The overall quality and taste of the dishes did not impress and seemed average to other fine dining establishments at less than half the cost.

The chef and staff, while friendly and hospitable, did not bother to mention these downgrades. Additionally, the meal was very rushed. We were often still chewing our last bites of the current dish as they removed our plates and quickly set down the next course. At this pace, we were finished with our supposedly luxurious meal within a hour’s time.

I had also mentioned we were celebrating my husband’s birthday and sadly, the restaurant did not even acknowledge this occasion, which I had convinced him we should splurge.

We have dined at many Michelin restaurants around the world and this one costed more than some three starred rated restaurants, but failed to deliver,...

At the time of this writing the majority of reviews are 5 star so you can’t improve on that as far as stars go but perhaps a bit more context will help those still on the fence.

First, the value proposition is fantastic. For comparison, at another well-regarded local restaurant, we paid 4000 yen (pre tax and service fees!) for two smallish pieces of Hokkaido venison loin in a relatively tasteless “Ainu“ sauce with some pickled veggie sides. At Kato you get a full course menu with sushi, tempura, and a variety of additional courses including a stellar eel-in-broth dish for 5000 total! Oh, yeah, they also threw in 2 fresh crab courses including a rare snow crab leg shabu shabu. Same price. We felt guilty paying the absurdly low (for this level of food) bill.

But the real reason to come here is the passion with which the staff and chef approach their art. Everything they do comes from a place of pride in their work. We got the feeling that everything was carefully chosen for a reason, from the sake to the homemade “fluffy” matcha salt.

Having lived in Dijon, France for 10 years, I also had a fascinating conversation with the chef about the differences between the Japanese dashi and French bouquet garni traditions.

Highly...

The worst experience in Japan without any doubt. This is a FRAUD, it is a place ONLY to catch tourists and the food is TERRIBLE. We had amazing omakasse experience in many other restaurants in Japan, in Niseko we had an amazing dinner in Sushi Shin, that we can reccomend to everyone, but SUSHI KATO is the worst restaurant I’ve been in Japan. Since the beginning we noticed that it had something strange, the service, the menu, everything. They charge you saying the menu has for example white truffle, something they DO NOT serve. They mention in the menu they can change the dishes, however we expect at least they change for something as good as. Not only the white truffle, but also many other dishes. Even worse, not only they changed those dishes, but also ALL dishes disappointed us. YOU SHOULD NEVER GO TO THIS RESTAURANT,...