Izumi — Restaurant in Kirkland

I honestly can't even believe I'm writing this but I had to share the craziest experience I had here yesterday while visiting my sister. We stopped in to have a single glass of wine before doing some fun shopping at a neighboring store. I didn't sit down and order a saki bomb, I ordered a glass of Chardonnay. I also explained we had eaten just beforehand and so wouldn't be ordering food immediately, but that I'd let the server know if we decided we wanted to nibble on something. I had my baby in a sling and she was sleeping like a peaceful rock. The server seemed put off by my order for some reason, and shortly after going back into the kitchen, she, along with two other women, came to the table with the wine and ASKED ME IF THE BABY WAS BREASTFED. I was confused by what they were asking but then quickly realized they were literally asking me if the baby was going to be eating after I drank, in front of the entire restaurant. No joke. I explained that she was in fact breastfed, but that I had anticipated the day and so had pumped clean milk that morning for her. They continued to motion to their chests and point to the wine, saying, "Yeah yeah if you breastfeed it's no good with you drink." They did this in front of the entire restaurant, until I finally pulled out the mostly empty bottle of TOTALLY CLEAN MILK my daughter had finished not even an hour beforehand. I told them I had no intentions of feeding her after I drank and that there was 2 more bags of milk in the fridge at home waiting for us. One of them said, "Oh ok then, that's good." I was so mortified, it was unreal. I took my card out, paid the tab, and didn't leave a tip. I always always tip because it's the decent thing to do, but no way was I doing so after the whole encounter. One of the women came to our table, picked up the receipt, took it to the back where at least 3 other people looked at it, then proceeded to come back to our table and point to the receipt to ask "why I put no tip on that line." WHO DOES THAT?? I was so calm, SO CALM because I really wanted her to understand why it was so wrong for them to have done such a thing. I asked, "What if she was a formula fed baby? Do you ask every mother who orders a beverage how they feed their baby?" She tried to say it's the law to ask any mother who orders a drink if they breastfeed. It just got nuttier from there and she was clearly determined not to hear anything I was trying so hard to politely explain, so I told her, "Well I guess I'm sorry that you can't see how that's offensive, but it is." Her reply? "Ok, sorry, don't come back next week then." I was floored by the whole thing. Obviously will...

Now I have officially seen everything. We frequently eat at this restaurant in but as of today I will NEVER enter the doors again. I will not deni the food is good and the service is just fine...no I am writing this negative review for a completely different reason. Oh...and by the way I am a Greek/Italian man married to a 100% Japanese woman and love the people of the Japanese culture. As we entered the restaurant we were greeted by the hostess and just as we were about to be seated the hostess noticed my daughter in law carrying her (3) month old baby (my granddaughter) and told us that they were sorry but they do not allow babies in the restaurant (I am not making this up)(this really happened). As I looked around the restaurant I notice at a minimum (3) other children under the age of three and (1) of them was younger than my granddaughter. I did however also notice that the other (3) children were of Japanese decent and here is the kicker, my daughter in law is half African American so yes what I am saying is this establishment is clearly racist. Yes a word I rarely use but I have no other word that comes to mind, racist, racist, racist. I am appalled at their decision to not allow an African American child in their establishment and hope that anyone else will agree and choose to never do business here. We live in a crazy enough world already and we surely are better than banning African Americans from our establishments...arn't we??? Please join me and ban this restaurant from your...

Heyo from San Francisco. I didn’t know a lot of sushi restaurants are closed on Tuesdays in Eastside. We chose this one since it’s convenient for both of us to get to. I was feeling a bit iffy reading some of the horror stories of takeouts. Sushi should hold up better in takeouts than other food. We ended up having a good experience. They didn’t kick us out despite my friend eating up till closing. The workers are actually Japanese, which is a big plus. A lot of Japanese restaurants these day are run by Chineses and Koreans. It’s really hard to find restaurants run by Japanese so y’all have something good going on here.

I ordered their omakase. The lady offered to explain each nigiri but I declined. I highly recommend you to go through the pieces with them if you do choose the omakase. I was hoping for uni (sea urchin) so that was a little disappointing. I still enjoyed every single piece. I was surprised at the amount of fish they have per nigiri. Flavors was there. The freshness wasn’t a concern either so you’re safe if you avoid takeouts.

My friend ordered their chirashi bowl with ikura. They have option for tobiko as well. I like the overall presentation. The cuts of fish look appealing too. He really enjoyed the mushroom they added in. He wasn’t expecting that at all.

Anyway I’d say this could be one of the better options in the Eastside. I’ve only been here for a few days but I’m definitely down to try all these other options in Eastside. I have high hopes...