Ying's Sushi Bar & Lounge — Restaurant in Barnstable

Food was alright (amazing shrimp tempura roll though!). They do have a very large menu though and many other options looked and sounded great.

My main qualm is poor service for dining in. Only 2 other tables in the whole restaurant were occupied, but service was still extremely slow (which I don’t understand). There was a sign in the front for no host but also said to please wait to be seated, so my friend and I had to awkwardly flag down a waiter in the dining area after a few minutes. Once we were seated, it also took quite a while for my friend and I to get drinks, have our orders taken, and to receive a check.

On top of this, the staff sat us directly next to a very loud family with kids that were running around the restaurant, yelling, touching decor, and literally coming up to our table. I understand it’s due to the fact that we had to be seated in a waiter’s section, but the only other occupied table in the restaurant was seated far away from us and the loud family... It just further ruined our experience on top of the slow service and frankly made us uncomfortable. I wish the restaurant had been more aware of this and had tried to address the issue with parents as it’s also a safety concern. All shame is on the parents, but it should not be on other customers themselves to speak up about this bad behavior (nor did I want to escalate the situation by doing so myself).

It also worries me that this restaurant has several years of negative reviews about rude and poor service, but seemingly no accountability and further disrespect in their responses. I regret not taking a closer look at the reviews prior to dining here. If service does improve then I’d love to try and dine here again!

Edit: I really appreciate the restaurant’s timely and respectful response on this review. I understand that being short staffed and having inconsiderate customers are always difficult challenges to address. Best of luck with everything, and I’m looking forward more now to coming again...

9/2/24 - I ordered take out and all the food was great! It was so good that I actually ordered again the following day.

9/3/24 - I ordered again. But this time the experience wasn’t so pleasant. Apparently I showed up too early and the food wasn’t ready. I politely ask the hostess (who was very nice) when do you think it would be ready. I was not in a rush. If it was going to take a few more minutes then I would’ve waited. If it was going to be longer, I would have left and stopped at the store and return.

The hostess ask the gentleman (wearing the Bluetooth headset) making the order, how much longer it would take… I hear him rudely respond to both of us: “it’ll be ready when it’s ready”. He can’t simply give a “5 more mins, 10 more mins” etc?

So she was not able to give me an ETA on my order. I explain to this gentleman that I was not rushing him. I simply wanted to know if I should wait longer or if I should run out and come back. His rude attitude towards me and his fellow coworker was so appalling I had to say something to him. I asked him if he thought it was appropriate to talk to paying customers like this? I asked him if he would think the Owners of Ying’s would appreciate his distasteful attitude towards their customers? He rolls his eyes and responds with a disingenuous “thank you for your feeddback”.

I never write negative feedback. I thoroughly enjoyed the food so the actions of the sushi chef really put a bad taste in my mouth. Thank you to the hostess for being kind but the owners of Ying’s should be aware of this.

Edit: hilarious response from the disgruntled sushi chef. Yapping off about how they can’t provide a simple eta on a weekend when I ordered on a Tuesday night lmao.

Clearly this is an establishment that can’t handle feedback with grace and as you scroll through the reviews you can see rude customer service is a common trend. Changing from 2 stars to 1 star...

A few points of feedback:

Food: The food here is mediocre. One of the sushi rolls we got were good but the other one missed the mark as the seaweed salad inside it tasted off. We followed it up with an order of gyoza which given the size of the menu we knew were not going to be handmade but we were hoping for proper cooking. This did not happen, they were ice cold in the middle and thrown on the plate with water dripping off of them. The Bangkok roti tasted good but again could tell it was thawed and the size of curry served with the roti is inadequate given the amount of roti served.

Service: Our server was kind and very attentive - kudos to her. However, the requirement that you need to tip 20% irrespective of service sits poorly with me. Raise the menu prices by 20% but leave tipping in the hand of the customer. Otherwise, this is a forced tax.

Ambiance: The ambiance is cute with lots of Thai pieces of art and furniture. However, the restaurant would have a more polished look if these pieces were dusted and well maintained. You could tell that there was dust collecting on them. The lampshade above our table had wads of dust stuck to it.

All in all, the people are kind and trying their best. Would recommend they focus on a smaller menu and accept the feedback. If you're in town and want a quick meal - drop by, but double check what you ordered and take it to go.

Edit: Given their response, all has been said. No grace in accepting feedback and a classless act of a restaurant. For 25 years, they have been serving mediocre food then and they are willing to call a paying customer's opinion uninformed as opposed to trying to rectify. Ratings have been moved even lower...