Akitaya Japanese Restaurant — Restaurant in Makati

We got to know about Akitaya through a Tiktok feature. We usually eat at Seryna for Japanese food in the area. However, after seeing the Tiktok feature, we said, why not try it.

We came in at exactly 11am and was given the standard greeting by two staff. We were the only customers by this time. Immediately, the one who served us seemed to be in a bad mood, flinged the menu and placemats and was scolded even more for transferring to another table. Kept my cool because I don't want to ruin my day. When I ordered, she was very curt and did not offer any explanation despite me saying that it's our first time. When I finished my order, she then said that if we were willing to wait, saying that the cook has not arrived yet. So I asked, "so this is an advance order. What time will the cook arrive?" And she said (with the other lady chiming in), they do not know, traffic is heavy. Having this information, we just gave them the benefit of understanding. Maybe the baf service was due to their stress of having a customer but the cook has not arrived yet. I was in the mood to be patient and confirmed that we were willing to wait.

Another group came in after 15 mins, the other lady took their order. Someone arrived and it seemed like it was the cook.

In fairness, the food was served in 15-20mins after the cook arrived. The Sashimi Tei consisted of squid, octopus, pickled fish, and tuna and the Tempura Tei. It was good and the wasabi was awesome. The tonkutsu ramen was just okay. At this point, the lady who served us was in a better mood, smiling at us. We decided to engage her by asking for her recommdation from the dishes shown in the Tiktok feature. She enthusiastically did so and we ended up ordering the Wings Gyoza (this one was different) and salted chicken skin (very umami).

Overall, it was good. But some items, we felt had a high price point for what they are. Will i eat here again? Of course. But if i am going to be objective and honest as far as having Seryna as their direct competition is concerned, I would choose the latter. But kudos to the Tiktok feature, now we have...

Had lunch here with an office colleague on her suggestion. The restaurant is on the upper floor of Makati Cinema Square (Fernando entrance) and you should know that there's another Akitaya restaurant along Mile Long a few blocks away. No idea if there's any relationship between the two.

I have the impression that this is a bit less popular than the other Japanese restaurants in the area of which there are many, but I quite enjoyed my order nonetheless and did not feel shortchanged by not going to one of the more popular restaurants.

Tendon (P350) 4.5 This is the best tempura I've had outside Japan. Batter is crisp and well seasoned, shrimp is a bit well done, and a really good sauce. I'm not too sure what's exactly in it but it seems to be tenkasu, tempura sauce, and probably some oil. It's an improvement from what you ordinarily and you get a bowl of the stuff on the side!

Donburi has a good helping of rice, nori, two large pieces of ebi tempura and one small piece of eggplant tempura. For the price, this is pretty good and I wish this restaurant was walkable from the office.

Sakura Ebi Kakiage (P300) 3.5 The serving of kakiage is pretty generous with four large half moon pieces which could easily be shared between four people considering their size. Kakiage was crisp but could have had more shrimp or at least shrimp forward taste. This was served with tempura sauce on the side but I found the tendon to pair a bit better. Tendon had crisper batter.

In terms of taste, this is a 3-3.25. Upped to 3.5 for cospa.

My two orders were both fried food and what you would typically get from a "jumbo" tendon order, but with my changing tastes it was a bit too much and I would suggest pairing something else with the tendon such as sushi.

House tea is really good and can be ordered as iced or hot.

Miso soup was also pretty good.

Service was attentive and orders came out fast enough. Payment through card is accepted but card return could be improved since there were not many diners when we went.

Definitely will come...

Discovered this place through Tiktok! We celebrated our 4th wedding anniversary here in Akitaya.

Ambience: feels like you’re transported to Japan! The interior design and music are on point. Majority of the customers are Japanese.

Service: no complaints for the 2 resident servers, one also doubles as the cashier. Service time is not the fastest though.

Food: taste is just okay. Food are served hot and fresh from the kitchen. They are known for the kiritanpo (we got shoyu and miso flavors) — we liked it! We haven’t tried the other Akita specialties of this resto - Japanese hotpot and Inaniwa udon.

For appetizers, we got the gyoza (very good) and bacon-wrapped potato (weird but okay).

We looked forward to the sushi, but the salmon and ebi sushi were not the freshest. We liked the uni and tamago sushi.

For the main dishes, we got katsudon and tonkotsu ramen. Both are pretty good.

Value for money: very affordable! Our total bill was only 2,500php (no service charge).

Parking: free parking is available.

Overall it was a pleasant experience. You can get better Japanese food elsewhere, but if you want to feel like you’re in Japan, you got to give...