Samurai Gyoza Restaurant — Restaurant in Tokyo

First of all, this review was written without AI—I couldn't shake this moral burden. I'm going to dinner with friends I'm visiting Japan with, one of whom is celiac. You might say: you guys are geniuses for going to a place that only serves gyoza—give me a minute to write this down. Before sitting down, we mention this and are told that they can prepare some meat and rice. The waitresses pass by, but he isn't served anything - it's a kind of tasting menu with 15 different gyoza. Around the eleventh or so, a nigiri with wagyu arrives. Basically, an hour and a half has gone by and he hasn't been served anything except a measly piece. We don't want to complain, thank God there's 7-Eleven and we can figure something out later. When it's time to pay, the samurai draws his katana: full price for everyone. I point out that a menu cannot be full price, at least the discount (maybe I'm dreaming, but in Italy they would never have charged you). He says okay for the discount, we go to pay for the card and the agreed discount is not on the receipt - we point this out but the samurai avoids any comment - two hours of dinner, we pay and let it go. The gyoza were neither good nor bad, I won't comment on that. The service and professionalism were terrible, as were the speed and math at the end. Don't be fooled by the 4.6 stars and don't bring celiacs or they'll starve them to...

Saw the exceptional reviews, thought we would give it a shot. Came in with high expectations. Unfortunately, this place did not deliver.

The food is an attempt to elevate Gyoza (Japanese dumplings) in a samurai themed environment. The Gyoza are presented one at time with a short performance. These performances are by far the highlight of the experience! The staff doesn't take themselves too seriously, the concept is fun and could honestly work very well.

However, the food is... amateurish to put it nicely. The presentation of the dumplings is nice, but the flavors are simplistic and it is difficult to differentiate many of the courses. The attempts at 'elevation' essentially consist of taking 'expensive' items such as gold leaf or artificial caviar and adding it to the Gyoza to differentiate them. It didn't work. The food made the meal feel tacky and explotative.

Finally, there is the price. At current (October 2024) exchange rates the price per person for this experience was ~$35. Which, in the grand scheme of things, isn't particularly expensive, but for this area of Shinjuku with its wonderful and inexpensive local izekayas and ramen shops, this is highway robbery.

Do yourselves a favor, venture out and find somewhere different. This isn't a good representation of the food that is available...

Many reviews call this place a tourist trap, and if I were being completely honest, this place is expensive, however the delicious food and entertaining service makes up for the cost.

Food 🥟: 9.5/10⭐ We got the short course menu. All of the dishes were amazing. One of the appetizers was ginger. At first I wasn't excited for it, but after tasting it, I couldn't stop. My personal favourite was the black pork gyoza. The ice cream at the end was also very enjoyable. It was creamy, flavourful while not being too sweet.

Service 🔥 🗡️: 10/10⭐ The service was the best I've experienced in Japan! Our waiter was very polite while also being fun. Whenever we needed something like water, our waiter was very quick to get it. Also, when he brought the wagyu gyoza, he put on a quick humorous show that I won't spoil, but you can watch him cook it.

Atmosphere: 6.5/10⭐ The decorations were quite pretty, but there was also a small fly flying around. It didn't try to go near the food, though.

Summary 📝: expensive 💴 💴 💴 delicious food 🥗 🥟 🍨 quick, attentive and fun waiter great decorations ⛩️ there was a fly, but it wasn't annoying 🪰

Tourist trap or not, I had a very memorable experience at Samurai...