Zaoh — Restaurant in San Francisco

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The amount of food they serve has decreased to a noticeable extent.

What's worse: the service has really gone downhill: with the restaurant being half empty, I was refused a seat even in a 2-person table. I had to wait for a space at the bar. After much consideration, I left the restaurant. Service is really essential to a dining experience.

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I must admit that I found it difficult to review this restaurant.

This is because I have never spent so little money (less than $20, pre-tip) and felt so full at a Japanese restaurant: the amount they gave was truly surprising.

Yet, Japanese restaurants are quite different from, say, Chinese restaurants, in that Japanese restaurants typically serve minute amounts of food, that which is highly delicate (sometimes it's the taste of the food, and sometimes it's the arrangement of the foods, and sometimes it's both, such as kaiseki, a traditional Japanse multi-course dinner).

Therefore, if I were to judge the food they serve by the standard of being delicate, I would have to deduct a star or two, as the food here have no connection to either meaning of delicate, as aforementioned.

With that said, I do think this place gives good, or even great, value if you don't judge its food by how delicate the food is. As is evident from my photo, although the salmon was on the smaller side, the amount of tempura was ample, as was the amount of salad and rice on the side. I don't want to reiterate, but I was truly astonished to barely being able to finish my plate.

In all due fairness, it is possible that their sushi or sashimi are delicate, but as I didn't order any, I can't comment on those.

Speaking of which, they offer combination plates known as A+A, A+B, and B+B, where A is some cooked item, and B is some raw item, and the more B there is, the more expensive the combination plate is.

Although the place is quite small, and I don't like the divider at the entrance, service was good and prompt. What I like the most about the service, however, is how the waitress chose to look away while I was signing the credit card charge slip, and deciding how much to tip. At some restaurants, the servers literally stare at you and react based on how much you are tipping.

I know how some servers depend on tips to make a living wage, but I really appreciate that this waitress wasn't giving me any pressure to tip: because I felt so comfortable, I tipped even more than I...

I’ll be honest, I came here with a date I was trying to impress. She was really excited about sushi, but when we got here neither of us were very hungry.

Don’t get me wrong, the food looks great, the kitchen is clean, the place is packed and there’s lots of atmosphere.

The truth is we’ve been into each other for a few years, and just never managed to get it together. So it seemed that we got a little distracted from ordering…

The menu is simple, a QR code on the table and you can check out the photos and descriptions on your phone.

We went for the edamame, Maguro and salmon five piece sashimi (they were cool to give us half-and-half Maguro and salmon), and the Spider roll.

My date was eating the edamame with chopsticks. OK, is this a test? Fortunately I figured out how to pop out the edamame from the shells and pick up each one with the chopsticks. Passed the test!

And as for the sashimi, the Maguro especially was fabulous, the ginger was fresh, but the wasabi could’ve been a lot hotter. I like to have my sinuses blown open.

The Spider roll presentation was impressive, it was crunchy inside and they even had wheat-free soy sauce for dipping.

I was happy, and I even made my date laugh. All’s good in the world.

If I was in a hurry, I probably would’ve been picky about the service. I mean really, did they only have a one server for the entire restaurant?

As it was, I preferred being left alone to have fun talking and laughing. So,...

Ok, so... I've lived in San Francisco for 35 years. Over those many years I have seen this humble place many times, usually when I would go shopping at the dear departed Goodwill flagship store across the street. But it wasn't until I read a recommendation of it on Reddit San Francisco that I finally decided that it was high time to go check it out. Bear in mind that this restaurant has been in business since 1984! Any place that has been in San Francisco that long HAS TO have something good going for it, and believe me IT DOES. I have been eating Japanese food since the late 1970s and this was one of the best Japanese meals I have ever had. They also offer some great happy hour and sake specials so be sure to check them out.

Miso Soup - House made. From scratch. To die for.

Shishito Peppers - Simply delicious. Lightly blistered, clean oil, sprinkled with crunchy sea salt. Yummm

Soft Shell Crab - Panko crust was a nice touch. Darker shade of brown than I expected but skillfully executed. Moist and not overdone. Crunchy!

Sushi - Much of it was literally from Japan. It was all fresh and delicious. Wonderful.

Sake - Impeccably cold. Subtle sweetness. Superb.

Atmosphere - Calm, Cool, Warm Lighting, Soft Music. Gracious, Knowledgeable Service. Great...