Curry House CoCo Ichibanya San Diego — Restaurant in San Diego

Today is the 3rd day of their "soft opening", I picked up to-go (they only have to-go right now due to COVID restrictions in San Diego) right at the time they open. I got there 10:35am for their 11am opening, and there is already a line (about 10 people); by the time 11am come by, the line quite long already.

I had been very excited ever since the news about CoCo Ichibanya coming to San Diego, so when I heard about its "soft opening" this morning, I just HAVE TO rush there. And to try to avoid long wait, I went there before its opening time.

Maybe it is still in "soft opening" and they haven't worked out the kinks yet, I was quite disappointed at their food. I ordered 4 different items in an attempt to cover they menu:

1. Minced Beef Cutlet & Stewed Beef Curry Rice $16.04 (+$1 for level 10 spicy)
2. Keema Curry Rice $8.29 (reg spicy)
3. Pork Cutlet Curry Rice $11.54 (mild spicy)
4. Side Chicken Cutlet $4.25

First off, (as you can see in my pictures), they forgotten to include the pickles (fukujizuke); I didn't realize that until I got home, and I felt so sad, almost want to go back to ask for them, but its just too far, 25min roundtrip. Then it was the subpar chicken cutlet and pork cutlet, they were dry, bland, and completely flavorless! I have had CoCo Ichibanya in Japan before, their pork cutlet is one of their signatures, and they were tender and juicy, but this pork cutlet that I had today, were just sucks. The chicken cutlet was not any better, also dry, and bland, it was breast meat, over cooked, under seasoned (or no seasoning). Meh :-(

The best of all 3 cutlets was the minced beef, it was at least soft and somewhat not dry, and it wasn't just a plain beef patty but more of a traditional japanese "hamburg" (probably beef, and onion and some other ingredients) patty. Comparing to the chicken and pork, this one was at least flavored.

The curry(s) were good. All 3 of them. I enjoyed them. The stewed beef curry with level 10 spiciness is good, very flavorful, strong, and spicy. It was not a crazy thai level 10 or ghost pepper/carolina reaper pepper spiciness, but it wasn't weak; so I think it was good. I do have an issue with the stewed beef chunks tho, they were tough and dry, I thought it is not possible to screw this up, but I guess, they can.

The Keema curry was also very good, a completely different curry taste profile, the minced chicken in the curry were good too. I also enjoyed it.

The regular curry was also not bad, a typical "good Japanese curry". Good flavor, and good texture.

So, I hoped my bad experience was just due to their "soft opening", or they might had been just opened (for the day). But typical Japanese quality control should do better. I may give it a chance in a few months, and I really want them to be good (I love Japanese Curry). But as it stand right now, I wouldn't be coming back anytime soon, or recommending my friends to go (yet).

CoCo Ichibanya SD, please get your act together. I really want you to be good!

Thank you for reading this review, I hoped that this review & the pictures are helpful to you in support of your dining...

I waited a few days to write a review so I didn't over react. My wife, daughter and I came in to dine. I love Cocos, needless to say the American Cocos are no where near as good as the ones in Japan. In either case I still dine at the ones in the LA area, those are kind of close and good enough to reminisce of Japan. Whenever any of the guys from work come to SD we have them do a Cocos run. Each time they've gone somethings been messed up... I tried not to take that into account and chose to eat here finally. My wife ordered her meal and she asked for a jumbo thai tea, the waiter said they were out... minutes later someone else would order and were told they were brewing some and it would be out shortly. Really? Ok... not a huge deal breaker. I normally order Chicken Cutlet Curry Level 10, Double meat, double cheese and two naan bread. I like to mix everything and then slather everything in between the two naan to make a giant curry sandwich. So I asked for naan... they were out. He said they had ran out earlier that day because it had been busy. To me this ruined my dining experience. This speaks a lot about the work ethic at this cocos. If the naan bread is prepackaged and just needs heating, were they supposed to get some on Sunday? Are there deliveries on Sunday? I doubt it. Which means the management did not place an appropriately placed order to account for the obvious high volume of costumers. And if they make the naan bread, why had more dough been prepared if they had seen they were running out? I instead settled for a chicken Cutlet curry with cheese level 5. It wasn't worth getting anything more without naan. The dining facility appeared clean but disorganized. The back hallway leading to the restrooms had these barricade type things against the wall, their legs stuck out into the aisle which appeared to be a potential trip hazard. The restrooms were pretty disgusting. So it gets the rating I gave for poor customer service, poor dining, and unkempt facilities. Good luck if you choose...

I had a deeply disappointing experience at this restaurant on March 29, 2024. It was my first time visiting San Diego to this restaurant; came all the way from Vancouver.

Not only were our orders messed up, I also got double charged. When I brought these issues to their attention, the staff seemed clueless and took an eternity to acknowledge their mistakes. They just assured me they processed the refund, promising it would be back in my account by Monday, March 31,2024. However, after numerous attempts to contact them and speaking to server Jolyna Heng and the manager, I received no refund and no satisfactory explanation. I called them on Monday as instructed since I didn't received the funds yet, they assured me that it might take longer to process because I used a Canadian debit card.

Finally, on April 18th,2024, I managed to reach the manager, who admitted that they hadn't even started the refund process until that day because the other workers does not have the access to do so. It's beyond frustrating that they made false promises and failed to take responsibility for their errors.

When the refund finally came through on April 19, it was less than what I was owed due to currency conversion rates. If they had acted promptly and honestly, I wouldn't have lost money on top of enduring such poor services. I had assumed the manager might offer some form of compensation for the inconvenience and frustration caused, but unfortunately, that didn't happen. This whole experience has left me thoroughly disappointed and I won't...