Jizake Sushi - 地酒すし — Restaurant in Laguna Niguel

This review is for the Jizake Sushi in Costa Mesa.

I arrived when restaurant was empty. The waitress attempted to seat me at the worst table for no particular reason. She started asking if I'd like to order appetizers or drinks before I'd even sat down ant taken my jacket off. (I hadn't even looked at the menu yet). The waitress proceeded to hover and watch over me as I looked at the menu which was extremely uncomfortable. When I asked what the difference between Agedashi Tofu and Tofu Nugget she had no idea. She had to go back and ask, then came back and kept repeating over and over that one was "stirred" as if this would explain it. The waitress also kept coming back about every five minutes. In short, the waitress was in my face the entire time, interrupting my conversation and lingering too long each time. She seemed extremely inexperienced or just clueless, and made being there very irritating.

Aside from the poor service, the food was not good. The portions were very stingy. The pieces of fish on the sushi were all only about 1x1" in size and WARM. The fish did not taste or look fresh. They kept falling off the rice when I'd pick them up. The rolls looked cute, but were over handled and tiny. Plus they didn't hold together at all when picked up with chopsticks. I ordered a miso soup. The portion was tiny and the soup looked and tasted as if the base had come straight out of a powdered mix - it was extremely salty, and the tofu in it was sour and spongy tasting.

I couldn't understand how this place has 4 & 5 star reviews until I saw that on each table there is a card that offers a discount on your meal if you "LIKE" them on Yelp.

The food is not that good, although it looks cute. It is way overpriced and the service is terrible. I wouldn't recommend this for your money. Try Nana San up the...

My family and I usually love Jizake and have been to this place multiple times over the years. However after last nights dinner not sure if we will come back. The first issue is that the server forgot to bring us 3 of our appetizers. I also noticed that my hot sake wasn't very hot and that they have trimmed down the size of their rolls. During the meal it became obvious to all of us outside that they were using a wifi speaker and whoesever phone it was hooked up to must have been moving around since the music was going in and out. Lastly while asking for the check I instructed the server to take the appetizers off our bill since we didn't receive them. He said he would and when he came back I was given a hand written bill with the break down. To his credit those appetizers were shown but not charged. I totaled up each line item and everything seemed correct as the subtotal was $170 with tax total should have been $183.17. However after taking my credit card he came back saying they totaled our bill incorrectly and apologized. Our new printed bill after charging my credit card didn't show the pricing break down for all the items but it appears that they added back in the money for the appetizers as with tax it came to $196.11 plus tip. By this point we just wanted to leave. After getting home we started not feeling so well. We don't usually have any bad reactions to sushi so maybe it was some sort of cross contamination issue. Either way I would caution everyone while eating at this...

No place better on this planet!! They've got it all, from the most glorious special rolls I've ever eaten, to the most bomb teriyaki chicken, all the way through to the tastiest miso soup everrr! Follow that up with some of the coolest dudes I've ever met behind the bar, supported by their awesome servers and greeters and you're having the time of your life! ... or just dinner... if that's what you prefer.. super cuddy little location makes it the local best kept secret, or most told of place you have to go to... it should be noted that if memory serves me, I found myself there for a solid 3 weeks straight at least once a day.. sometimes twice... think...