Yakitori1 — Restaurant in Butetown

Awful service!! I really wish there was a way to give no stars in this review, cause this place is absolutely awful. I've been here twice (although I said after the first time that I would never ever go back there, but there are unfortunately no other sushi places close by), and both times times I've walked out furious. Me and my friend arrived there today just as they were opening for the night, and there was only about 8 other guests there at that time. We ordered our food for takeaway, but only after we had payed they told us it would probably take 25 min for the food to get ready. Had she told us straight away, we'd probably gone somewhere else. We sat waiting for about 30 min, without getting any food, but at that time they decided to move us from the table where we were sat waiting to give place to a group of people. And, I might add, in a very rude way. So instead we were stood there waiting for the food drinking our green tea (that they of course charged us for). We asked if our food was on the way and they said it would take another five minutes. It didn't. When my friend finally got her food we had waited 40 min for it, it took another 5 min for my food to come. They never said sorry, or offered us anything. The closest we came to some kind of excuse from the grumpy waitress was "we weren't expecting this many people". I don't really think 8 people aren't a lot on a Saturday. So, after waiting for our overpriced, not very good sushi (I honestly don't know how it can take 45 min to prepare some raw fish..!) we hurried back to work, only to discover that they had only given us one pair of chopsticks and one small sachet of soy sauce. I'm not even surprised. I've said once before that I will never ever go back here, this time I mean it. The first time we sat in to eat, and it was a pretty unpleasant experience, but we figured maybe a takeaway would be slightly faster and maybe reduce the awful service we got when we were sat there eating, but today was even worse. Everyone should stay away from...

The takeover of the Natwest Bank office in Mermaid Quay has been nothing less than a transformation. Ultra-modern seating, glass panelling in shades of bold red and grey walls with industrial lighting creates a stylised urban feel to the eating area which is now Yakatori.

Yakitori#1 (meaning fried chicken) is the latest restaurant to arrive in Cardiff Bay. The sushi, sashimi and noodle bar is brought to Cardiff by husband and wife team Meng and Cheryl Yap, whose background stems from supplying goods to a global supermarket. Having successfully opened a month ago, the interesting and varied menu lends itself to the vibrant scene. A selection of dishes was suggested so we dived into scallops with soy, sesame and crispy ginger, tempura prawn maki, cucumber and chicken teriyaki, salmon and avocado with crab stick, goma wakame, seaweed and tobiko. This was all followed by a yaki soba, wok-fried noodles with chicken, tiger prawns, beansprouts, mixed vegetables, red and green peppers, spring onions topped with fried shallots.

It sounds a lot for two people and it was – we wouldn’t normally have this much – but as we were sampling it seemed appropriate and we were advised! Not a smidge of the evil MSG in sight, all freshly prepared to order in the open kitchen and if you have aversion to prawns but fancy yaki soba, they will happily oblige. Meng is very keen to keep customers happy and provide an enjoyable evening. I couldn’t make this at home and it was a treat and thoroughly delicious.

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Well, where should I begin? If you are after an authentic Japanese experience and are used to proper sushi and sashimi restaurants, you'd probably be disappointed. This is a no frills Polish/Japanese (yes, thank God one of the chefs beyond the counter is actually Japanese) restaurant with quite a limited choice of raw fish. The rest of the menu is quite standard. No much choice of Sake or Japanese whiskey, either. I ordered a variety of food. Tuna sushi was too petite (the rice/fish ratio should be inverted...more fish than rice, not vice-versa!) and definitely NOT good value for money. Eel sushi was not really sushi, as the eel was actually grilled. But better than the tuna sushi. Again, the amount of fish compared to the amount of rice is simply wrong... King prawns ramen was seriously good (although not served in a bowl, but in a dish). Scallops (it's a starter) were quite good and I ordered it becase it was recommended by the Japanese chef Spicy sushi temaki was OKish...the nori seaweed was too dry. Orange chocolate cake with vanilla ice cream (yes, truly Japanese, isn't it?) was the best thing I had. Really delicious. I drank a pot of hot sake and a Sapporo beer. I also wanted to order toro (tuna belly) sushi/sashimi, tokoyaki and any Japanese deserts, but none of these was on the menu. I paid £50.90 for all that, which is OK, I suppose. All in all, a...