Aker Restaurant & Lounge — Restaurant in Salt Lake City

I really wanted to like this place.

The ambiance is beautiful and bright, so inviting and a really upscale place to visit and grab drinks. With that being said, the food itself was subpar.

I preface with saying my partner and I eat out a lot, more than we should, and in comparison to other places we have been to, the flavors and cook of the main dishes left us really, really wanting. I didn't finish mine, and I was still hungry. It felt strange to keep eating when I found myself trying to eat the rest, despite my hunger levels.

Now, the appetizers were PHENOMENAL ♥️ we absolutely loved the Wagyu Gyoza and the Miso Rock Shrimp. Both delicious. However, the main dishes were not even close. At our table, we ordered the Wagyu Steak, Mac and cheese, Fried rice, Scallops, and the Miso Cod.

The good: the Scallops were good - 4/5. Solely bc they were slightly overcooked. I recognize it's hard to get the cook right. Our friend said they felt they were under seasoned, however, I liked them overall. The fried rice- very good.

The not great- Tempura veggies- not sure what they use to make the sauce, but it wasn't that great. It was different than other places, and it made me not want to use it bc it didn't add anything to elevate the flavor. Miso Cod- the fish was cooked off. It started out well, but it almost felt fatty to me. I could see what looked like fat connecting the pieces (not a lot though) but the fish itself didn't melt in my mouth and I found myself saying "I'm surprised how much I feel like I have to chew". The flavors were too subtle and underseasoned. The Wagyu Steak was the biggest let down. Fattier than we anticipated, considering it's Wagyu, and underseasoned. The chimmichurri sauce was weird. Too vinegary.

The bad: DO NOT ORDER THE MAC & CHEESE. Dear Lord. The lingering taste...I can still taste it. It tasted burnt yet didn't look that way. I questioned if there was blue cheese, but recognized it was just that burnt flavor. No one at the table liked them.

And for the price points of this place, this was regrettable to me.

With tip and tax, my partner and I paid $225. Came out to $171 before tax and tip.

TL;DR: Expensive, order drinks and apps only.

The drinks were great, the wine was great, but the cocktails are $17, which is also...

It’s a beautiful scene when you’re in there, but the food was comically bad. The service didn’t know how to handle hearing that.

Miso soup (never had a bad one in my life, it’s usually good or really good) was awful. 2x the price of a miso soup anywhere else which they justify on their 3 type of miso paste, but it was like eating warm bath water with some scallions. Zero depth.

The miso shrimp appetizer was so rich and coated in sauce it was saccharine. The shrimp couldn’t be tasted between the sauce and the breading which soaked up and inflated with sauce within minutes of being dropped.

The shrimp yakitori was equally drenched in a sweet creamy sauce. Shame because the shrimp itself had a great flavor after scrapping the sauce off.

The kale salad was drizzled with way too much dressing instead of dressed properly. Kale salads should always come out dressed since the greens are so hearty. The dressing was too sweet and creamy (you catching the thyme?) and tasted like the two other shrimp dishes’ sauces.

The ahi roll was the most palatable but over engineered and soggy. The roll collapsed and was a mess. Also was sauced with too much sweetness to enjoy the fish.

The beef gyoza were recommended and were awful. Tasted like plain ground beef in gyoza wrapper. The chef seemingly loves sugar but needs to figure out how to use salt, citrus, heat, and savory flavors to balance.

We told our server about the miso and he brought another bowl in case it was a “bad batch” (why would there be a bad batch??) and it was even worse. He was kind enough to remove from bill.

At the end of our meal seeing how little we ate he asked for frank feedback. I let him know that everything was too sweet for the fish but he didn’t know how to handle that feedback and seemed to wiggle out of it by suggesting we just had different preferences than other guests.

I’d love to go back but the idea of eating anything we ordered again, let alone paying for it, will probably prevent it unless I’m invited by someone and defer to...

I did a reservation for this “hot spot” in downtown for my best friend’s birthday. I wanted to pick something new and great in food quality. First of all, I called the restaurant as soon as they opened so I can drop of the cake for that night’s celebration, they were very unresponsive through their phone and even throughout the open table app. I had to go there in person with the cake and asked. The lead server was very nice and I helped me out to accommodate that. I left her a note that the cake was for my reservation and to remark that we have for a birthday that day. Later on when we went, the server opened up 2 bottles of sparkling water without asking the table which we didn’t even drink because we were only 3 people and mostly drinking cocktails. After that we order a few appetizers and asked the waiter for recommendations but she did not know the menu which was okay.. but situation started getting annoying when we requested the sever not to bring all appetizers at the same time since the table was small but still she did not listen. She did not know how to place the plates in the table or even organize it in a good way. It was very uncomfortable.. we ordered the bone marrow which was dry and with all honestly coming from the east coast one of the worst bone marrow dishes I have ever had, we had the oysters which were not too bad except for the fact that they were extremely satly and finally we ordered shrimp and veggies temperature from which we only got 2 shrimps. The worst part of this was the bone marrow it was definitely a disappointment we asked the sever to take it back and the manager came to apologies but to be honest I wish I never took my best friend there for her birthday dinner. We didn’t get any additional dishes and decided to go to TAKASHI which is not a fancy place but has great quality of food and flavor and the service is amazing! I wouldn’t recommend this place to any person that knows about good quality food.. Food looks good...