Duo Modern Japanese Cuisine & Hibachi — Restaurant in City of Saratoga Springs

It used to be good. It wasn't a great New Year dinner. It took 15 minutes to be noticed or acknowledged (even having reservations) despite several servers being in the large, open, nearly empty bar room. The hostess finally seated us at a tiny table in the dining room after she cleaned the two-top, took silverware off of one of many clean, empty four-top tables, gave us menus, and left to take photos of the large table that she obviously knew from the hugs, conversation, and drink order deliveries that I observed her make while we waited for water or even a server. When I watched the hostess finally tell a server she had to take our table (the young girl looked very much in opposition), she stopped at other tables in the room, spun in circles, looking around the room, and finally came to ours. She didn't want to take a drink order till we ordered food, and after whispering something while pouring a quarter of a glass of water for us, she turned quickly to leave, stating, "I will give you a minute with the menu." Mind you, we sat for 20 minutes and had been in the restaurant for 40 minutes. There was only another table of two, a table of three, and a table of 8 in the room; two servers (counting the hostess who took over the table of 8) and a ton of empty clean two and four-top tables. When the drinks came, she set down a glass serving bottle with the ice in the chamber vs the ice pod, an unopened sake bottle, and no cups, and left very quickly. I fixed the serving bottle myself by dumping the ice into my water and scooping it into the pod with my fork while waiting to ask the waiter for something to drink out of. When she finally came, she did not know the carafe, with a spout, wasn't a cup. After she got our cups, the cooked octopus appetizer arrived quickly. It was cold and rubbery. The ponzu was still good, even at room temperature. The entree? The Ikura sashimi wasn't fresh, but the sushi was passable. The next time I want sushi, it won't be from Duo, especially with an all-you-can-eat establishment in town with better service, a better atmosphere, comparable food, and much lower prices. Maybe it was...

I stopped in for a weekday lunch of sushi (not teppanyaki) and was initially disappointed that there was NO SUSHI BAR, despite this restaurant appearing in that category. I have had very bad experiences with sushi when I could not actually see and interact with the actual sushi chef, so I was obviously concerned.

I was escorted to a small table next to the partially covered window and handed three bound menus. The decor of booths and tables accented by damaged ceiling and less than clean floors was less than expected for Saratoga. My place setting was a mix of styles, contained actual hashi and a fork, with paper napkins, and fresh flowers in water placed in Coors Light pint glasses. The space was extremely quiet, with only 10 other guests in the main dining room. Luckily, I was far enough from the bar TV and the teppanyaki that the banging spatulas and knives could not be heard.

I found the menu did not contain tamago or saba, (usually, two of the most simple and inexpensive items, but also a quick measure of the sushi chef) so I ordered a couple of maki and a bunch of nigiri, as usual. The server was helpful and pleasant enough.

My miso soup was a welcome surprise, with enoki mushrooms replacing the usual wakame seaweed (photo). The two-plate main was plated simply, with very little decorations. The rice itself was lightly seasoned. The maki provided the lesser of the items, with an acceptable eel avocado, but unfortunate spicy salmon crunch, which was not spicy, but did have a crunch I was not expecting: a couple of small (1mm) bones hidden inside a bland salmon paste.

The nigiri was much better (photo), but no wasabi was added under each piece of fish, although that is common in the Capital Region. The individual pieces were prepared simply and efficiently, with the three gunkanmaki the best of the plate. The uni and ikura were fresh and the blue crab, thankfully, did not have the added mayonnaise/aioli.

I'll return, I just hope that eventually an actual sushi bar can be added to this location.

2019...

We had 9 people in our party and 8 of us got hibachi and one person ordered a kitchen entree. Everyone who ordered hibachi was very happy with their choices. The clear soup with onion and mushroom was excellent, even my stepson who is a super picky eater said it was delicious. So was the ginger dressing, fried rice, noodles, and the performance by our chef was great! However, the person who ordered chicken Teriyakifrom the kitchen was super disappointed. First they brought out their meal with our salads and they preferred to wait until we had our entrees. However, I do understand that this is hard to do because Hibachi is done in stages starting with the rice and then the noodles, then steak, seafood, and finally chicken and veggies. They also asked if the vegetables on the Teriyaki dish were sautéed the server said yes however the entire dish looked steamed including the chicken. There was some sauce on the chicken when they brought it out that didn't much look like teriyaki and then another employee came out with a side dish of sauce and clean that was teriyaki. Also, the same person who ordered the kitchen on Trey ordered a glass of wine before they were completely finished with their glass and the server took their quarter full glass from the table and just poured 3/4 of a glass on top of it. I thought that was kind of odd because as a past server you would either bring a new glass of wine and a fresh glass or wait until the glass was completely empty.... otherwise everything about this place was very enjoyable. I would definitely...