Sakura Japanese Steak, Seafood House & Sushi Bar — Restaurant in Ellicott City

I tried very hard not to write this complaint. However I’m getting zero correspondence or even acknowledgement of my complaint and it’s been over a week. I visited this location with my family and was humiliated in front of several onlookers in which a few began recording. My husband saw hair in his soup. I mentioned it to the chef and the chefs response was” our people don’t have hair like that yours do” . Did not offer a new soup- in fact he laughed. I asked him is he implying that because we are black and our hair is curly that this is my husband hair? My husband is BALD! Unacceptable that we didn’t receive the same service as any other paying customer because our hair is curly. To add insult to injury my daughter then saw hair in her food and when I mentioned to the chef he smiles. There’s so much more to tell about this experience I just am so humiliated, embarrassed, and on top of everything else I had to beg the manager for my bill. The chef made racial statements to my family- made us feel less than human and embarrassed and humiliated my family in front of a whole Restaraunt of people. We were not treated fairly at all we were stereotyped and mistreated because of the texture of our hair. We were made to feel BLACK and unworthy of a new soup! Manager tried to do damage control but it was too late. I’ve sent several messages to corporate and have gotten ZERO response. I will never give Sakura another penny and I will be pursuing legal representation since I can’t even get a response from Sakura. If the chef had just apologized and offered us a new soup it wouldn’t have been a big deal- this is our fave restaurant and we frequent. We drove 45 minutes to get there. Instead, he made derogatory statements, refused to treat us like any Restaraunt would treat any normal human being. No one should ever have to experience this. But because I’m black with curly hair we weren’t given the same treatment as everyone else. I’m disgusted with Sakura and I want them to take responsibility for what happened and how they made me and my family feel. They ruined our entire weekend and to add to that my 19 yr old son got sick after eating his food (he’s the only one that ate). Still no response from GM , nor corporate. A customer complains of racism and sickness and no one responds for over a week but the MGR made the GM aware?????? Manager claims he doesn’t know the name of the general manager but says he did make the GM aware of the incident. So why hasn’t anyone followed up? Total disregard for what took place. This is absolutely unacceptable. Never again. I’m hoping this review will inspire someone to contact me. I gave the manager my name and contact info! I have video recording of...

Good

Filet Mignon, Shrimp, and Salmon were cooked and seasoned perfectly.

Accommodations for wifes allergies were handled well.

Bad: Lobster was burnt. Not slightly overcooked but black on the outside. Was inedible. Chef was distracted ( more on that) and noone made any effort to fix the messed up food.

While cooking they put white sauce on the lobster and fried rice. I know alot of people love the sauce and maybe this is thier recipe but it is not standard in a hibachi recipe. It was put on near the end and almost looked like uncooked butter. If I want mayo on my lobster, I'll order a lobster roll. Did not like at all.

Now for the most fun. The family that shared the grill with is had a sick child. He threw up A LOT on the table. The mom did thier best to cover it but it was just too much. Although the chef was clearly distracted by this he just kept on cooking like nothing happened. It took near 10 mins for the reataraunt staff to come out and start cleaning the mess. The young man that started cleaning it came out wirh a handful of small paper towels and just smeared it around. It was disgusting. Chef tried to get other staff members attention for help but most looked at it and pretend like they didn't see OR in one case came up close and just nodded thier head and walked away. They made no effort to cover it or clean it in an organized timely manner so about 20 mins of our meal was staring at a huge puddle of vomit. Both the other family and my family opted to leave at that point. Restaraunt made no effort to comp anything and they just pretended like it was another normal dinner service. I know they can't be blamed for a customers actions but good customer service would have done something.

Minor thing but for some reason they acted like I was weird when I asked for soy sauce for the sushi.

Will not return, because of how they handled the vomit situation and the absolute murder of...

Good food & great hibachi chef but the hostess and manager were unprofessional. The hostess was stubborn about sitting my mother, who had just gotten knee surgery and needed to keep her leg elevated, on one side of the table. When we asked if we could sit on the other side of the table (which made more sense so she could elevate her leg and still be facing the table), the hostess refused. When we tried to explain why it made more sense, the hostess told us just to sit on the side of the table where she had already placed the menus and walked away. Keep in mind, there was no one else at the table except for our family. Also, they watched my mother walk in to the restaurant with her brace & crutches, so it was very apparent that she was handicapped and may need to be accommodated. When I brought up the issue to the hostess and manager, the hostess was defensive, and the manager defended the hostess by saying she was new. At the very least they could have apologized to my mother on our way out, but instead they saw us getting up from our table and ran away from the hostess stand. The hostess and manager had zero compassion for an obviously physically handicapped customer, and ruined what was supposed to be a celebratory & birthday dinner. Very disappointing that we had this experience at one of our old childhood favorite restaurants. It’s one thing to make a mistake or have a misunderstanding, but when the issue is brought up to the management I believe they should try to...