Sakura Garden — Restaurant in Hamden

It’s taken me 10 years to talk my husband into giving this restaurant a try. Its location (at the end of a strip mall anchored by Hamden’s supermarket for poor people) made him suspicious. And when you’re eating raw fish, you want to be confident in the quality of your food. Despite the somewhat shady location, it’s a totally different experience once you step inside.

There’s a little pond with fish and turtles in it, some fake glowing cherry blossom trees (fun fact: that’s what “Sakura” means in Japanese), and a circle-shaped bar that all contribute to much better ambiance than you would expect in the price rite plaza. I’m only giving it four stars for ambiance though because a) my husband was weirded out by the fake fish on the wall in the bar area that he had to look at during the whole meal and b) the hibachi section is noisy and full of kids crying, people screaming, etc. If they could isolate the hibachi section a little better, it would be a more pleasant dining experience for everyone else.

Everything we ate was outstanding (including the “outstanding roll” - my husband’s favorite). Service was absolutely perfect - better than I’ve had in fancier restaurants. For example, we ordered a bunch of stuff including a couple soups. He asked if we want the soup first or everything as it’s ready. I really appreciate that. Too many times at other places they’ll give us our entrees before our starters arrive. I find that so annoying and it ruins the meal.

Anyhow, excellent food, perfect service, and surprisingly nice vibe inside (if you can ignore the loud hibachi people and fake fish...

VERY UNCOMFORTABLE VISIT. First the TV was blaring over my head & the waitresses wanted to watch TV, so instead of turning it off, they turned it down a little. We ended up asking to move to the other end of the restaurant. Then we were constantly rushed to order even though the restaurant was almost empty with ppl at only 2 other tables. We kept asking her to give us time & she kept coming back to rush us & then she got impatient & started explaining the menu to get us to hurry up. My date was starting to get annoyed by her. When we had our meals & were spending a lot of time talking, but still had a lot of food on our plates, 2 waitresses kept coming back to ask us if we were finished like the wanted us out. I asked, "Um...are you closing?" knowing full well they were open for another 2 hours. We ended up leaving because the vibe was so awkward. When we tried to finally leave we had a hard time getting them back to the table cuz they wouldn't turn around & check on our table again. All the waitresses were facing the other direction talking for a long time. This service overall made my first date very uncomfortable & I didn't appreciate it. The food? Most of the sushi was good, but my date didn't like his...

This place is great. We've only ever had hibachi there, but we go at least once a week. The food is yummy, the service is good and it's fairly reasonably priced, although if you add a few cocktails to your dinner, it can bring you well over $100 for two pretty quickly. The hibachi chefs tend to do the same schtick every time, but we're there for the food, not the show, so it doesn't bother us. The one issue I do have is that when you're seated around the hibachi grill with other customers, they'll sometimes give the other customers a "taste" of the food you ordered, therefore decreasing the amount you get and you're the one paying for that dinner. In addition, if another customer wants more teryaki sauce or less salt on the rice, for example, instead of separating the food and flavoring that smaller amount to the customer's liking, they make the whole batch the way that one customer requested. Doesn't really work to the benefit of the whole table. Aside from those minor issues, it's overall very good food and they do give fairly big portions of the rice and noodles, which is always great to bring home...