Kyoto Japanese Restaurant — Restaurant in Salt Lake City

I've been to Utah three times now, and during those three trips I have made the most of my meals. Utah has a great food scene, and I've truly enjoyed a lot of what I've experienced. I think my meal tonight at Kyoto, however, is the best meal I've had in this state!

To begin, I have to comment on the beautiful landscaping outside. As a plant person, I really appreciate both the variety of plants throughout the property, and the meticulous care taken to make this garden next level for a restaurant. I particularly enjoyed the variety of conifers and the careful pruning. It was like a small Japanese botanical garden!

Okay, let's get inside. The owners put as much effort into the layout and style of the interior as they did in the garden! From the tatami seating to the authentic decor, I was very much immersed in the theme. Our server, Ping, was the absolute best! So friendly and genuine, we all loved her! Everything came out fast too. Very impressive service.

I ordered a locally made unfiltered sake called Tsuki White Peach Nigori Unfiltered which was fantastic! We decided to skip appetizers, which I'm so thankful we did because I had a LOT of food! My meal came with miso soup which was incredible! I've never had a miso soup I didn't like, but this was clearly made from scratch.

For my main course, I chose the combo plate, which included two options: Beef sukiyaki and torikatsu pork. It was basically two full meals on separate plates! The torikatsu was very good, but holy cow, that beef sukiyaki was AMAZING! This dish is a stew with thin sliced marinated beef. It was served with yam noodles, mushrooms, and huge chunks of tofu. So much flavor! I can't recommend this dish enough.

I also tried my friend's saba shioyaki (grilled mackerel) which was also excellent. One more about the mackerel: there are some tiny bones in there so pay attention as you eat.

After dinner I tried the ginger rice pudding and once again OUTSTANDING! Such a great dish!

I'm going to be dreaming about this meal for a long time. When I visit a place multiple times I tend to never eat at the same place twice. Next time I'm here in SLC, I will definitely be eating at Kyoto again, and realistically, ordering the exact same...

The service, food quantity, and food quality have gone down so much compared to last year when we were there for dinner. It was my favorite restaurant when we visited Saltlake city last year, We were looking forward to coming back to Kyoto for some nice Japanese food. We decided to celebrate Xmas Eve at Kyoto, and we made our reservation over a month ago. Today, we show up right at 5 pm when the restaurant is just open. We sat down and didn't even get the menu and water until 10 minutes later. When the food came, the beef sukiyaki flavor was not good (way too sweet and salty), the beef teriyaki sauce was glue like, some the sashimi pieces were so skimpy, it was the width of a chopstick. We were a party of 8, most of us were done w ourselves meals, except 2 of the kids were still working on the meals ( but almost done). The so-called manager came over and rudely told us our time was up and we must leave, while the kids were still eating. He claimed someone had told us we had a time limit on the table, but none of us heard or were aware of that. I politely told him, give the kids a few minutes to finish their food so we all can leave. About 5 minutes later, the manager came back forceful and said, " times up, you must leave now", the kids literally chocked down some of their food in 30 seconds and left the remaining food there. I felt bad for the kids. They didn't even have a chance to finish their food. I have to say this is the worst dining experience we even had in a Japanese (or any) restaurant. The manager's attitude was so bad that he is a disgrace to this restaurant. His rudeness left us and the kids shocked. We were silent while we drove away. We spent over $250 here tonight. We wouldn't never come back here again. If the manager came to us and explained the situation in a better attitude, we would understand, it would have been a much better outcome. It is just unfortunate that someone has no customer service experiences or common sense is there to serve...

Had a bunch of takeout last night. Included Tonkatsu (deep fried pork cutlet with rice and Japanese plum sauce) 2 rolls, agedashi tofu and beef gyoza.

The food was cold - all of it. Normally I would give the place a mulligan because - it's covid and it's hard. But not this time. We arrived at the curbside pickup point right on time. We called to let them know we were there at the appointed time - 7:05 pm. They told us the were finishing up. We called again at 7:20 - 15 minutes later. They said they were only waiting on the rolls.

It then dawned on me that all of the hot food had been done for some time and we were waiting for the cold food - just the opposite of what you want as a customer.

Food came a few minutes later. It was about then we were questioning the 20% tip we gave when we ordered (again, it's covid - we always tip 20% - even for takeout. I think it's the right thing to do - even if the service isn't great)

Got home and my worst fears were realized. The heat was trapped in the containers and our warm food was cold and wet from the steam. It's hard to warm up mushy food in a microwave and make it taste better - too bad there isn't a dehumidify setting. Anyway - $85 later we wished we had gone somewhere else.

As far as the sushi rolls - I'd give them a solid "meh". I lived in Japan for many years and speak fluent Japanese. I don't ever compare American Japanese food to the real thing - but there are deviations from the mean. The lobster roll was supposed to have langostino - which looked suspiciously like canned shrimp. Add to that fake crab and Miraclewhip and you have one of the worst sushi rolls I've had in a while.

Checked Kyoto off the list. Should have gone to Kobe, Tsunami or Takashi for Japanese food in SLC. I knew better but decided to give Kyoto a try....