NIKU X | Limitless Wagyu BBQ & Seafood — Restaurant in New York

Overall rating: 2.75/5 stars - Could be better! Full review on Yelp due to Google Review limited characters.

TL;DR Must-gets:

Toro with Ikura and Caviar A5 Wagyu Tartare Lobster Romesco Norwegian King Crab Australian Wagyu Pure Bred Zabuton Japanese A5 Wagyu Rib Eye Steak Japanese A5 Wagyu Rib Eye Yakisuiki

From the moment we went in until the moment we left, all the servers and hostess acted professionally and charismatically; they were all easy to talk to and welcoming, exemplary of what elegant service looks like!

Appetizers: The toro and tartare were both exquisite; fresh, perfectly portioned, and flavorful!

Seafoods: The Lobster Romesco was fresh and paired really well with the creamy sauce, and the Norwegian King Crab were pretty fresh and cooked perfectly to ensure that the meat remained tender and not mushy, pairing perfectly with the smokey butter! The miso seabass was very rich and creamy, but overly sweet and came as a heavier portion (4 pieces for 2 people), which can be a bit much when you're also eating wagyu that's also rich and creamy. The lobster tail was mushy and wasn't as fresh as the Romesco, so I'd stay away from that. They ran out of the king crab legs which we were bummed about.

Wagyu Grand Tasting: The must-gets are the Australian Wagyu Pure Bred Zabuton, Japanese A5 Wagyu Rib Eye Steak and Yakisuiki! They were so rich, creamy, and required bare-minimum seasoning to bring out it's true luxurious potential, with my favorite being the Yakisuiki; although the sauce was a bit overly sweet, I still liked the egg combination to add to its creaminess while diluting the overly rich wagyu! You get a tasting box that comes with a decent portion of each so you can pick your favorites. The wagyu tenderloin with uni and caviar that's limited to one per person came early through the night but was remained uncooked for over 20 minutes, resulting in blood started emanating out of the meat which may be visually displeasing.

Sides: I don't recommend getting the uni fried rice. As evident in the picture, it is a big bowl of rice with two slivers of uni. It's a easy fix where I think if you let diners choose between a medium and small size bowl, it'll provide a more individualized experience where people won't feel unnecessarily filled up by something so unexpectedly large.

Now onto the various issues that detracted from our experience in addition to the less memorable selections highlighted above: Although the friendly nature of the servers were great, their servicing was sparse and not consistent at times, which resulted in us grilling some of the meats our own. The flame was quite intense and the grill not oiled completely where some of the meat were stuck onto the grill (as evident in the video), and at times left an intense char due to the grill not being changed the entirety of the meal. My wife requested the meat to be well-done for her and our baby, but the meat was often burnt which made it inedible for both my wife and our child unfortunately. The vent cover by the legroom area also fell off onto my foot (as evident in the two picture, one with the covering and one when it fell off), which one staff apologized for and another fixed it eventually, which all can be seen in their in-room camera. Lastly, they also ran out of the matcha ice cream, which could have helped counter the richness of all the wagyu, but instead they had matcha and yuzu cheesecake, another two incredibly rich and creamy option..

Overall, this was unfortunately a disappointing experience due to the abovementioned issues. Leo did his absolute best to try to give us a good experience, and a lot of the issues were not something he had control over, so I hope this review can be taken with an open-mind for our intention is in hopes of elevating Niku X to help them reach their full potential for being one of the best AYCE Wagyu fine-dining in all of NYC that we know they are capable of!

Thank you for reading and...

It has a lot of potential, but there were a couple of mishaps that really spoiled the meal. I want to say that I'm not an overly critical restaurant go-er; I can definitely forgive some mishaps. But the large confluence of them over our evening really spoiled the restaurant experience. For over $200 a person, I would expect the restaurant to really deliver more.

I'll start off with the issues:

We got seated late. While this isn't a huge deal, they really stressed the fact that there is a 100 minute time limit. After we had sat less down for about 55 minutes and have yet to receive all the items on the menu, we were already told that we needed to make a "last call" for any items so that the table can be free for the next guest. This caused us to be put in a bit of a panic to decide what we needed to order to finish out the meal especially since so much of the initial time was spent waiting around for our food to even arrive and we weren't even remotely full.

Technical mishaps with the grill. Our grill kept extinguishing entirely. We couldn't even flag down our server to help us address this issue so we just sat around twiddling our thumbs. He tried to start it several times and there was once where a massive pop was heard as all the natural gas that had been leaking got ignited. I immediately said that I feel unsafe and uncomfortable with this equipment, but this was dismissed entirely saying that "these grills are like that". Sorry, I've been cooking for a long time. No grill is designed to have uncontrolled gas become ignited like that.

It wasn't until the manager came in and changed the grill grate that the problem was resolved. All the meanwhile, we were expected to eat meat that was cooked lukewarm over a half on, half off, grill. We felt like our concerns were dismissed and this felt more like a $20 AYCE KBBQ place where we should be expected to eat what was served and just deal with it.

The pacing for food is really bad. We spent so much time just sitting around and waiting. There was no way to flag the waiter and we didn't get checked in on frequently. This added to the stress that we needed to "finish quickly". We were later told that we were actually the last guests for this room so we could actually take our time. Sorry! The meal is over already since you rushed us 20 minutes prior. Why are they treating us like cattle?

No ice cream. What the heck! How do you not have the only dessert item on your list? If you don't have ice cream, just go down the street and buy it from 7-eleven. This was not a good end to the meal.

On the positive side, the meat quality was really good. The appetizers were all very tasty and each bite was very tastefully executed. There was nothing that I ate that I disliked (aside from the badly cooked meat due to the grill issue).

I was originally thinking that having a Chubby Group membership would be worth it. However, with such a subpar experience, I really doubt I want to spend any more money until the quality and service improves more.

Even with all the mishaps we paid full price. I'm actually not sure if I would even have wanted to pay half this price given what I had experienced. Maybe it'll get better in the future as the staff and the restaurant works out all their kinks. I won't know, because I probably...

Got there 10mins early for my reservation at 8 on a Monday. Had to wait in the bar for 15 mins, had to asked the bartender how much longer do we have to wait. She go and ask the host up front and they said another 5 minutes. Got seated but then had to wait for a server to acknowledge us and ask us which menu we want. Waited some more. They finally served us food at 8:36 but surprisingly it’s not what we ordered and it was not a starter. It was clearly a lobster tail. My husband and I were confused as to figuring out if it was seafood tartar. We were so hungry and had to eat because they were really taking forever. How disappointing to wait so long and the first starter you want is wrong? Then we asked another staff what it was and he told us it was lobster Romesco. Ok. Fine. When we ordered 5 starters, they bring us the opposite of what we want. Then we rejected them because we didn’t ask for it. Then they sent us crab legs in the beginning of the meal. I told them “I did not ask for this and not ready to break it down. I want to try meat first. “Our first starters that came was at 8:42pm. Mind you our start time was 8pm. I’m going through my photos and I got sea bass when I didn’t ask for it along with my tuna tartare for the first two dishes. I got oxtail dumpling when my husband clearly didn’t want it. We ate it anyway out of spite because we waited so long already. Somehow we got wagyu sando when we want wagyu tartar. Asked for the A5 meat and took forever to come. When it came, the first 5 meats were chewy and hard to swallow. I didn’t expect it to be like that. I did not get the AYCE experience because we only ate a dish once……. The server was always nowhere to be found. We were not in the private rooms. We were seated in the middle. I asked for Wagyu tartare from the get and Never got it even though I reminded him few times. If you don’t have it please let me know. Don’t say it’s coming. The server has no idea or care what you order. He’s just sending whatever he wants. It was very frustrating and it was my husband’s birthday. We had to wait long gaps for food or even someone to look at us for napkins. I’ve had better meat and experience at a regular bbq place in Ktown. Also near the end when I requested for another ikura x caviar he tells me the kitchen is closed. Why didn’t you warn me last call or something? We literally did not get to try everything on the menu nor the few dishes we want. Even if we were able to, we were unsure which one to even reorder because it’s not even that good. Only the ikura x caviar starter was my favorite. All the meats we had to dip in soy sauce for flavor so they mostly taste the same. And plus they’re so fatty. They emphasized the Australian and Japan A5 but it was super chewy. Is it supposed to be like that? I was not full. The server asked if we wanted matcha ice cream. I mean I guess I have to? Bill was $400 for 2 people, I should’ve went to an American steakhouse or Michelin star. I’m sure service and quality is way better. This place really left a bad taste for us. Felt like we weren’t treated fair. The whole time I’m just like wth...