Sakura Japanese Steakhouse — Restaurant in Five Forks

Went here for the first time for an early lunch today with the family and had a great lunch. Since moving up to the Greenville area awhile ago, we have not been able to find a consistent and good hibachi restaurant. We finally pulled the trigger to come here and I am glad we did!

The restaurant is clean and their hibachi rooms were clean as well. In classic hibachi restaurant style the salads were swimming in dressing, which is a plus in my book, and the ranch and ginger dressing was good. The soup was salty, but in a good way with good onion flavor and some chopped green onion.

The star though, and we did not have high expectations given oasted hibachi experiences in the area, was the hibachi. The chef was great and was engaging with our 3 yr old. Typically when you go to a bad hibachi the rice and vegetables are bland, the chicken can be rubbery with a bad sauce and same with the steak. This was not the case, every dish had great flavor. The rice was crispy and had amazing flavor on its own without ever needing white sauce. The vegetables were cooked well and again, had their own flavor profile which almost never happens. The steak was delicious, chicken was amazing, the rest of our party had the ribeye and scallops and they both received amazing reviews. Our kid, who is a typical kid, even said how yummy everything was multiple times, which I hardly get that at home! Lastly, I saw reviews for portion size and did not have an issue here. Easily have two meals.

The big question is consistency in restaurants like this, so I will be interested in going back and see if they can keep it up. As of now, we would highly recommend.

Went back in...

So incredibly disappointing and downright awful. We had family visiting for Christmas and thought treating them to a Christmas Eve dinner out would be lovely. From the moment we walked in it was bad. We waited 45 minutes to be seated (we had reservations, of course) then waited another 25 minutes for a chef. The floors in the dining room had food and debris all over. My mother in law had to be persuaded to sit down she was so disgusted by the food all around her chair. The green tea was so weak you could hardly tell it was tea, the miso soup was a bowl of salt water. The chef put a massive amount of over seasoned rice on each plate and a very small serving of vegetables. My husband and daughter ordered ribeye steaks and chicken. I was shocked when I saw how small the servings were and what was there was gristly and incredibly poor quality. The chicken had a very strange taste and both she and my son in law who also ordered chicken barely touched it. I ordered shrimp. It was over cooked and tough. We had nine people in our party. We consumed no appetizers or alcohol. Three people ordered soft drinks and three ordered green tea. Our bill was $352.00 (including a %15 tip). There was no bartender at the bar, no greeter, little seating in the lobby for the long wait for our table and it was way understaffed. No one bothered to inquire if everything was ok or if anyone needed anything. The one compliment that I’ll give is to the server who refilled the sodas several times. Overall however, an absolutely...

My family loves Hibachi! My husband the most. Tonight we went to Sakura Japanese Steakhouse for my son’s birthday celebration. We try to mix up the Hibachi places we go to and this is the 3rd time we have gone there! For us it’s also right across the street so it’s a perfect location! Unfortunately tonight was a complete upset and we will not ever return. My husband is allergic to seafood, never been a problem, he actually laughs and says they make his first. At Sakura we were told they would have to make his in the back… never happened before there. Hibachi is yummy but it’s also supposed to be fun to watch them cook in front of you. Well he agreed because it’s was my kids birthday and not only did they bring it to him 15 minutes before the chef was done making all of the non-allergy food on the open grill but the portion was about the size of a kids plate. I went to the front and explained that it came way too early and it wasn’t even a normal portion size, especially for the cost! They did come back and take it to the back but came out with it 10 minutes after everyone else got their food… same small size and all. Not only did they embarrass the crap out of my husband for having an allergy, they didn’t give at all what he was supposed to get, didn’t apologize, and don’t make it a hibachi experience! So disappointed and angry! Imagine a grown adult being embarrassed for having a food allergy and being singled out, imagine how a...