David’s Deli - Kosher — Restaurant in Tokyo

I worked here during lunches and maybe some of you saw me! My last day was March 31st, 2018. My working holiday finished and I'm back in Canada now. I was actually born in Israel - not sure if that's a coincidence or if that's the reason the Israeli owner David himself hired me. :) By the way, he dines here in the evenings in case you're interested in meeting him.

I'll start with my experience working here with some details behind the scenes thrown in, and I'll move onto the overall quality later. Feel free to skip through!

My time working here was pretty nice overall. It had a really rough start with the former manager. I believe he's a nice man overall. Has good morals. He just had some communication issues. I'd rather not get into it too much, but the gist is that he kept assuming that I don't know anything. He'd start long explanations that I didn't need... and then complain about needing to keep explaining everything. Communication was difficult. Perhaps some customers felt a little bit intimidated as well. But like I said, I believe he's a nice man at heart. There was this bird one time that couldn't fly and he felt really sorry for it and wanted to help it.

That was the Japanese man. He inexplicably left in August so we were down to 3 staff members, and the new manager is a Nepalese man. Things for me were smoother with him.

The cook is a very nice older man named Horigome. He's very nice indeed, and really knows what he's doing in the kitchen! He's efficient, knows the recipes like the back of his hand, cooks wonderfully, and always smiled at me.

Perhaps around November is when we got a 4th staff member (I know - 3 is a rather small amount for a restaurant, but they all work full time and can handle large parties). She's a nice lady named Shima and she generally handles everything up in our in-house bakery. This includes making our variety of cakes, burrekas, and of course the scrumptious pita bread!

Of course, I should get to the actual customer experience, right?

For my staff meals I had a lot of the restaurant's food, and I can say that it's really quite good! I'll admit the dinner menu is quite pricey (this is around the Shiroganetakanawa area after all) but the lunch menu is priced very reasonably! Since I worked lunches that's what I know. Most sets are 1000 yen and come with your choice of either a pita or bagel with hummus, or a salad, along with the meal itself, and then a hot or cold cup of coffee or tea to drink after! Not too shabby! If you don't know what lunch set to get, go for the A lunch with pita and hummus!! It's a sizable chunk of chicken schnitzel that's a little vinegary on the outside and has soft white chicken inside! Incredibly delicious and our most popular item! Horigome makes the hummus himself from chickpeas so it's fresh and soft! Put some in the warm pita bread before biting in.

Other lunch meals include falafel balls - recommended with pita bread, chicken ball soup, spicy curry, and steak. You can't really go wrong with anything.

The interior feels authentically Israeli indeed with stone tiled floors, walls lined with glass panels with Hebrew scriptures, and some Israeli books for you to check out. The first floor has TVs playing the news, and it sometimes stays quiet and sometimes gets busy. In my opinion, the second floor is really where it's at. Just a large, quiet environment that's really nice to relax in. As it's a smoking area some folks on their work break often come up to have a meal and smoke a bit. Apparently around 15 years ago a legendary Japanese actor would often come up and sit at the middle window table because he enjoyed the view. I heard this from the cook, so ask him or the manager! Sorry to say I forgot which actor it was.

I know this review was way more information than any of you needed or wanted, but I think I mostly wrote this for myself. It's nice to reminisce. I feel very nostalgic about my time in Tokyo. It was the best year of my life. I'll be coming back to live as...

This review addresses the awful (lack) of service, not the food. The food looks quite decent, which how I got a chance to share Aayam's experience of this restaurant's terrible service.

I arrived at 4:30pm on my bike, only to be told that they didn't start serving until 5pm. I only wanted to order takeout of hummus, which could've been easily taken care of, but I didn't protest too much and waited for 30 minutes. The bald employee clearly saw me wait outside for that amount of time.

Once it was 5pm, I went inside with my bike. I had decided to take my expensive bike out for a ride today, and didn't bring a lock since I never leave it outside or out of sight. I was told that I couldn't bring the bike in. This is understandable, but I tried to explain in Japanese—I've studied the language for 7 years and have lived here for 3—that I only wanted a quick takeout order of hummus, that I didn't have a bike lock and didn't want to leave the bike outside where it could be stolen. The employee completely ignored me and talked over me.

Only after three minutes did he realize that all I wanted was a takeout order of hummus, to which he told me to...leave the bike outside. He had not heard a single thing that I said. He then turned his back on me and began serving two other customers. Too angry and frustrated to talk to someone who clearly decided he didn't want to treat me with respect, I left.

On the face of it, I arrived too early and tried to bring a bike into a restaurant. Those are no-no's. But if someone patiently waits 30 minutes for service, any decent restaurant should at least try to listen and work with the customer for a solution. It would've been easy for them to take my ¥700 and ask me to wait outside until they brought my hummus order out to me. But the employee at David's Deli was not interested in providing service to a customer and was satisfied to assume I was just a clumsy gaijin who didn't understand Japanese. This is disgraceful service that others have reported of this place, and I will never come to this...

David’s Deli (Kosher) – A Hidden Gem in Tokyo If you're looking for authentic food in Tokyo, David’s Deli is the spot.

Big shout out to Oscar! He was great, it’s was worth coming just for him! Super friendly, knowledgeable, and welcoming. I tried the shakshuka, hummus with pita, falafel plate, Buskara Asado, and shawarma—every dish was incredibly fresh, flavorful, and made with real Middle Eastern care.

The shakshuka was rich and spiced perfectly, the hummus was silky and bright, and the falafel had the perfect crispy bite with a soft, herby center. The Buskara Asado (slow-cooked pulled beef) was melt-in-your-mouth amazing, and the shawarma had that perfect smoky char.

For a gourmet variety of tasty kosher food in Tokyo, this is hands-down the best place. Fresh ingredients, bold flavors, and warm service—David’s Deli is...