gi-jin — Restaurant in Pittsburgh

Make sure to bring your raincoats….

Booked back in January. Finally able to get a spot at the bar in April. Ate our first meal, the nigiri plate. Then half way through eating, the cup rinser at the bar broke and sprayed my girlfriend and I. The bartender and waitress apologized immediately and gave us a free cocktail. Accidents happen so no big deal. We then ordered some more food and continued eating. They then begin trying to fix the cup washer. Instead of just waiting for us to leave they needed to fix this now. We then got sprayed again, and began holding up our napkins to stay dry. One of the bar tenders even noted that they should stop as we were shielding ourselves with our dinner napkins… Someone then came and they proceeded to try and fix it again. We got sprayed one final time before dessert, before they finally decided to shut off the water. It was a really bad experience for something we were looking forward to for so long. The waitress was very apologetic and gave us free deserts. But no amount of free food makes you feel good about getting spray with bar water. Food was mediocre at best, and the experience was abysmal. Go to Umi instead better sushi and at least you won’t get wet.

Update: Contacted Lance Fields from guest services and he was mortified this occurred at the restaurant. He informed me that the owner would be calling me back to make things right. The owner never reached out, so I am guessing in their mind, it is ok for your patrons to pay hundreds of dollars and to spray them with bar water….

Another update: Still no one has reached out to me regarding this. Done want this review to get bogged down so I will update it every month until someone contacts me from this company. Please don’t waste your money at a place where they obviously don’t care about customer service.

Final update: We decided to give gi-Jin another go. To our surprise, the rain jackets were not needed. The crew at gi-Jin took care of us and made the experience 100x better then our first visit. They provided us with some nice apps, (on the house) and a complementary desert. I am happy that they recognized the error in the ways, from the first experience. I would gladly consider going back after...

After waiting for a reservation to open up and thinking we'd have to wait another two months to get in, we finally got very lucky to find two spots at the sushi bar only two days in advance (must have been a cancellation because usually there's no chance of getting in without waiting months!). The service, ambiance and food were all amazing. Even though we showed up a little early for our reservation and just before opening, we were warmly welcomed by the staff.

We started with the hamachi crudo, which had melt in your mouth fresh hamachi, and some interesting sweet and citrusy flavors in the whole presentation, all of which paired well with the extremely rich fish.

We moved on to the nigiri, which we ordered a la cart strategically so that we could try the toro, hamachi, and hotate (scallop). Every piece was delectable and so fresh. I literally had to pause after every bite just to savor it.

After that we shared 4 hand rolls: mushroom, beef tartare, hamachi, and eel. All were delicious but we were totally blown away by the mushroom hand roll, which had deep umami flavor. Unfortunately we didn't get a picture of that one before it had disappeared into our mouths.

We finished with the beef tataki, which was probably the heaviest and most umami-heavy dish. The beef was so tender and the mushrooms again had the most wonderful flavor.

All the drinks we had were also wonderful but I would have to say my favorites were the Roku 75 and the Martini Kihon. The Roku 75 is a sparkling wine cocktail that's light and refreshing and pairs well with all the flavors in the dishes we tried. The Martini Kihon is a delicious martini with a slice of cucumber in it. I also enjoyed the Gin Tonic but thought it wasn't quite as exciting as the other cocktails. The Grand Lotus Aviation was also great but I thought it was heavy on the lemon, especially on its own, but it did pair well with the sushi.

Overall this was a memorable dining experience and definitely worth the price point for a...

いただきます

FINALLY found a legit Japanese food. We lived in Japan it was tough to find authentic Japanese food in PA. Tough to compare BUT Gi-Jin…🙌🏽⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ My hubby and I ordered A5 Miyazaki Wagyu nigiri, wow, wow,wow! Melts in your mouth. Just had to give highlight on their A5 Miyazaki Wagyu. It’s a must. $27 a pop that you will never regret. I could have ordered 4 more for myself but I didn’t want my hubby to pass out. LOL😆

What else we ordered:

Salad- was yummy. Good balance of the ginger dressing with the salad. Crunchy onions was done perfect.

Toro nigiri- i can still remember how it melts in your mouth. You don’t even need shoyu for that.

Spicy tuna hand roll -yum yum

Sashimi platter- you can’t go wrong, all of them melts in your mouth. I was a bit concerned about the sea brim but I had my doubts bc I was concerned it was gonna be rubbery, or making it a red snapper (🤢)It was delicious. Best sea-brim.

Toro hand roll was 👊🏽 ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ I had to slow down and took my time eating this. So good!

My hubby ordered spicy scallop handroll. He loved it. I’m not a big fan of raw scallop (it’s a texture thing for me..lol)

Wasabi microgreens and shiso leaf! Omg…brought back memories of living in Japan.

Can I say the wasabi was authentic? They did add daikon but I get it. Real wasabi is pricey. So good! Best wasabi I must say. Balance of that punch was just right. Tsukemono and pickled ginger were delish! I could have had a bigger bowl for that. Lol!

I will never go anywhere else except Gi-Jin for real sushi/sashimi experience.

Service was amazing! We got lucky that there was avail seating. We didn’t know we had to make reservations. It was meant to be. Now we me now! Thank you for the experience.

We sat outside and love the ambience of the outdoor seating. Weather was nice so we were happy to be seat outside. Especially for not having reservation. We will take it.

ごちそうさまでした　(Gochisōsamadeshita) Thank you...