Midori Sushi Akasaka — Restaurant in Tokyo

Sushi is superb and price is good but beware if you do not understand Japanese. The main point of my post is my group’s experience at this store. We walked in and ordered on the tablet - there were English menu available on the tablet so ordering was easy. One of the items we ordered is a grilled fish collar bone (please remember this note because it will come up later). In the middle of our meal, a waitress came and presented a huge grilled fish collar bone in all Japanese and indicated a “five” with her hand. The “five” did not make sense to us because we were a table of four and since none of us understood Japanese I thought she meant to split it into five pieces. As we ate the fish collar bone, we started a conversation about why the grilled collar bone is cold. My father had a theory about how this is a sushi store so everything should be served cold so it is better for the palate tasting experience…. 🤔 (I did not agree with my dad’s theory). After we started eating, another smaller plate of grilled collar bone is served. That is when we realized the smaller collar bone is what we originally ordered (and it was served hot). I was naive enough to think the bigger collar bone was free because earlier they had to cancel one of our dishes earlier because it was sold out so I thought this was a gesture of kindness with parts of the fish they probably didn’t have other customers who want it since it was served cold and was not on the menu (maybe already prepared for quite a while). Because of the big collar bone, we couldn’t finish what we probably ordered and so my mom proceeded to ask for a take out box for the cooked food. The waitress then pulled out her phone and used google translate to explain to us they can let us do takeout with our consent - I think this is for health and safety reasons (again another important point to remember for the latter part of my story). Little did we know, when we saw the bill, the big collar bone became one of the most expensive dish on our meal costing 5500 yen. You can call me stupid and I already blame myself but I really think it was unfair for them to not make sure we understand that we are paying for a dish we didn’t order. It was very clear that no one at our table understood Japanese. And clearly the waitress had the ability to translate it with her google translate app on her phone when my mom tried to get a take out box but didn’t bother to do that with the 5500 yen fish. I also think it was my fault for being lazy or too trusting and not trying to use the google translate app on my own phone but note there was no wifi for customers in the restaurant and I don’t have an unlimited data plan. The whole event also happened very quick and I was not in my working mode but in my eating mode. I also thought it was dubious that she only presented the large collar bone to our table and no other tables. The two tables with us are all locals…. I will probably never visit this store again and whenever anyone starts to say things in a language I don’t understand, I am going to make it my reflex to pull out google translate even if it means data fees because at the end of the day I don't think a few mb will be more than 5500 yen. I am also going to make it a goal to start learning Japanese. (I guess I will try to be happy about this experience thinking that the large collar bone tasted...

I am actually sorry that I have to make this review, because until now this place was one of my favs. The sushi is really good. Unfortunately I had a bad experience with one of the cooks/chefs. I was seated at the bar where they cook. I went alone, 32 year old woman. As soon as I sat down the person cooking right in front of me started to make fun of me by asking if I want a beer..that was clearly mockery. Also he was laughing and a couple of Japanese people laughed too. Then, I went on ordering. After I ordered the same guy asked me if I wanted something, to prepare for me. He didn’t know English very well so I didn’t understand what it was but I said ok. It was a sea urchin, that I did not like. Nevertheless, he offered to make it, so no problem for me. I ordered 3 kinds of sushi, after I finished the 2nd one he said something in Japanese. I said “sorry”? and he laughed and said “have a good day”. The people next to me laughed as well. I didn’t feel comfortable with all this mockery and laughing so I decided to leave anyway, because it was clear that he will not bring me the 3rd type of sushi I ordered. He gives me the bill and there it was, on the bill, a big fat price for the sea urchin that I didn’t order. It was half the bill! I said that I won’t pay for that because I didn’t order it, and he took it off the bill with no comments. So….what was that? They were about to charge me double for something they offered? Plus all the laughing and mockery? Very, very rude. This was an older employee. I think one of the oldest. I will not return,...

We arrived about 40-45 mins prior to closing and although there was no one else waiting for a table outside the restaurant it took them a good 30-35 mins to seat us leaving us less than 10 mins to order. There were empty tables inside so was a little perplexed. In any case when we were shown to our table there was no direction on how to order and we proceeded to try to navigate the tablet on the table. The English language version of the menu on the tablet wasn’t working so we eyeballed the items we ended ordering and submitted everything in Japanese via the tablet as the waitress did not come to our table and I had a feeling the ordering app on the tablet would lock us out at closing time. Sure enough we put in some orders and when closing time came along the app locked us out. The waitress then only came to deliver the food to our table and handed us hot green tea and didn’t ask or interact with us to even ask if we wanted anything. Oh she did come back to say that they we closing and to tell us we can’t order anything else (via the app I guess). Ok language barrier aside, there was different treatment to us foreigners compared to other tables. After we got up to leave and pay the check upfront, as we left the wait and sushi chef staff started laughing so loud and I think they were making fun of us. At the end of the day, foreigner or not we all want to be treated with mutual respect. Although their sushi was mostly reasonably priced, we will not be returning due to the...