Sake Sushi — Restaurant in Rancho Santa Margarita

‏I arrived here for lunch on a Thursday around 1pm. I asked for a to go menu and but didn’t have any and told me to go on their site. The site was down and all I found were menu photos from customers back in April 2022. I decided to go with the 3 item lunch special with beef teriyaki, crunch roll, and sashimi combo. It also comes with rice, salad, and miso soup for $18.00. When I got rung up, it was $21 with tax, which I realized was a price increase from the April menu (okay, we’ve had record inflation the last 6 months, so it’s all good). The food: Beef teriyaki: I grew up in Seattle which has a pretty high bar for juicy and tasty teriyaki. I have yet to find anything in Cali that’s close. The sauce had a lot of potential but the beef itself was dry and tasteless. Salad and miso soup: they were both pretty good. Sashimi: This came with 3pc salmon and 3pc tuna. Both were pretty dry. Very disappointing since they charge an extra $2.50 for sashimi “upgrade”. I’ve had better sashimi in belt restaurants and definitely better in sit down restaurants. Crunch roll: the roll itself (rice, crab meat) were fine. The crunch was stale and not crunchy. Also disappointing. Should have stuck with Cali as the crunch ruined the taste for me.

Overall, it’s a toss up between 2.5 and 3* for me. They should update the website or have to go printed menus in the meanwhile. The sushi quality is definitely lacking - not sure if it’s due to being opened to air or because it’s old, but that’s my main deterrent from...

I've only eaten there once. I was craving tempura so I found them on the internet and made a to-go order. I ordered a tuna sushi roll and I specifically asked that it not be "spicy" tuna. I ordered tempura and their katsu chicken as well. When I got home, I found out that I was given spicy tuna in my roll. For others, that might be tolerable... for me it was inedible. The chicken katsu was good. Nothing to write home about, but good none the less. The tempura was good but it was missing the tempura sauce. The tempura sauce container was there... but it was full of katsu sauce. Maybe you're thinking that they gave me 2 katsu sauce containers. No, they didn't. The katsu sauce is in a smaller container. The tempura (katsu) sauce came in a much larger Styrofoam container to accommodate the 'dipping' you'd do with the tempura. I emailed them on their website and explained my dilemma as well as attaching a photo of my receipt. I never got a reply. So, I'm never eating there again. I did give them 2 stars because the katsu and the tempura was good; although the tempura could have been better with the tempura...

First visit to this spot. Food was decent. The Cajun Seared Tuna was the highlight for me. Very good. The Unagi was ok, a little dry for my taste, but not a bad choice. The stars reflect the service. Sat at the bar but had to wait for the server to hand my ticket to the Sushi Chief. Found that annoying since I had to wait 10 minutes for her to come back and see if I was ready to order. Why couldn't I just hand it to him? They had two ladies bussing and running drinks but they had no service skills. Angry faces and rudely tossed my check on the bar without a word and walked away. I had my credit card in hand for her but she didn't even see it in her rush to toss the check and go away. I'm not a fussy guy and don't ask a lot from folks serving me in a restaurant. But at least be pleasant and smile at least once, and maybe not toss the...