Takahashi — Restaurant in Portland

4/3/25 2 stars🌟🌟

I have been coming to the takahachie restaurant since 1973. This is a nice little restaurant with great atmosphere and excellent food. The sushi chefs are top notch. They also offer a percentage of your meal off depending on what day and time you come.

I've always been very satisfied with my food and service anytime I've been there until today. The two small tables were full and the waitress asked me and my friend to sit at the bar telling us we would get faster service there anyway. It took her 20 minutes to take our order. It took another 20 minutes for her to bring us our salad. 15 minutes later we received the three rolls we ordered but no tempura. We were finished eating our sushi and I was looking for the waitress to cancel the tempura order when she came out with it. By this time we were ready to leave. It took 5 minutes to flag her down for a to-go container. She was irritated, and came back 5 minutes later, tossed it on the table in front of my purse, and disappeared again. It took another 5 minutes to get her attention so I could get a second to go container. She angrily pointed at the first one. Not only did I have sushi AND tempura to take home but there were two of us. They don't bring the check to your table anymore, you have to wait on yourself. They expect you to come up to the cash register to pay your bill.

It's not like this Sushi is on a train in a mall restaurant. This is a fairly nice bring your family sit down restaurant where they charge relatively high prices for their food. They have six Sushi chefs, one taking to-go orders waitress, a busboy, and one waitress for the rest of the restaurant. So you can expect little to no customer service. However she still expects a big tip. My guests went up and paid the bill with my credit card as I have mobility issues. I noticed later the waitress added an 18% tip to the bill without my authorization. I tipped the sushi chefs while I was at the sushi bar. We spent an hour and a half at this restaurant for three sushi rolls and some tempura that did not even come until we were ready to leave. We had a rude waitress, that we never saw, that expected a tip, and we had to cash ourselves out. Not only that, we didnt even get the percentage off on our food.

All in all this was not a pleasant experience. This was 5:00 PM on a Saturday. Why was this restaurant too cheap to have two waitresses so the patrons could have some decent service.

The food was great when we got it. Too bad the experience was ruined by bad...

Not sure if it was an off night due to the heat or staffing issues. Was optimistic to try this place out based on the reviews and photos.

Went in last night for dinner and quickly noticed there were some flags. The waitress seemed overwhelmed and figured it was a dinner rush issue so I politely asked for what was needed: water, napkins, and plates when the tempura veggies arrived. Veggies were adequate and warm (1 star). The shrimp tempura was a different temperature and the texture was milly.

After ordering nigiri, sashimi and some rolls to access if more was needed, another server arrived to inform me that one of my orders could not be made because it was pre-mixed. I asked if it could be made with other ingredients due to a food allergy and she said no and I asked to have that roll cancelled. This was a sign that not all ingredients are fresh and the kitchen was unable to make a fresh alternative.

Sashimi order was supposed to be the mix of tuna, yellowtail and unagi but arrived at the table as all yellowtail at a warmer temperature than anticipated. Rolls arrived and the sushi chef attempted to make the roll that I asked to be cancelled by adding a side of siracha. The sushi rice lacked in flavor and texture, seemed under seasoned and the texture was granular as if it was day old. The Yellowtail sashimi was not the same grade as the Yellowtail nigiri. The plain tuna and fresh salmon nigiri was good quality cuts of fish (1star).

The waitress returned at the end of the meal and when we expressed our concern for the wrong sashimi order, her response was it was the kitchens fault not hers. In lieu of making an issue, me and my friend got up and paid.

In summary, the atmosphere is family friendly, as in there will be a screaming baby in the large back room as there was last night. The wait staff could benefit from checking in with the table sooner and accommodating customer requests.

It's an okay place with okay food, if you like okay beer with less than...

We have ordered take-out from here before and the food was good, so that is the only reason for two stars. My partner took us here for a date night and we arrived just before the evening rush. When we sat down, there were two full tables and the table next to us was being cleared. It took about ten minutes for the server to come take our orders. We have heard that restaurants are struggling with staffing and we were trying to be patient. We ordered sushi, hot food, and a beer. The server brought the beer and it's the last we saw of anyone for over an hour. The restaurant proceeded to get very busy and we watched them hand out at least 30 to-go orders while we sat at a table with no food. The table next to us that had been cleared sat another party after us, and they received their sushi and hot food before we decided to leave. When we finally decided we were too hungry to wait any longer, we paid for the beer. The perplexed person at the counter tried to check on our food but it still wasn't even up yet an hour and a half after we ordered. Pretty sure they just forgot to put our order in. They need to pause to-go orders and focus on the people sitting at their tables. This restaurant totally ignored us and ruined...