Ishoni Yakiniku — Restaurant in Seattle

Disappointing Service at Ishoni A Loyal Customer's Perspective

As a long-time patron of Ishoni, I have been a loyal customer since their days in Bellevue. Despite the inconvenience of their relocation to Seattle, which requires us to spend a significant amount of time on the road, my family and I still make the effort to visit the restaurant at least once or twice a week. We are avid fans of their Wagyu barbecue and have recommended the place to friends, hoping that the restaurant will continue to thrive.

Due to our late work hours, we often have to quickly put our children to bed before rushing to the restaurant to catch their last order. However, on several recent occasions, we have been denied service because the restaurant decided to "close the kitchen" earlier than expected. According to our understanding, Google states that the restaurant closes at 10:30 PM, and when we called to confirm, the receptionist informed us that the last order is taken at 9:45 PM. Therefore, when we leave our house at 9:00 PM and arrive at 9:39 PM after a 40-minute drive, we expect to be served （we always order the same thing as soon as we sit,like within 2 mins). Unfortunately, the restaurant has repeatedly made last-minute decisions to close early, disregarding their publicly stated hours and the information given over the phone.

This has been extremely frustrating, as we have wasted 80 minutes on round trips only to be turned away. Today, even after calling to confirm, we were still told by the server that the kitchen was closed earlier. - everything was cleared. We had even sped up our drive to avoid delaying their closing time, but obviously they decided to end their work even earlier.

If the restaurant does not intend to serve customers at 9:30 PM on Saturday, perhaps they should consider updating their operating hours on their website or changing their policy to reservation-only. But instead we were told walk-in is welcomed during hours.

We requested the contact information of the restaurant's management to inquire about their inconsistent service and to suggest updating their hours online to prevent others from experiencing the same disappointment. However, the staff refused to provide us with the manager's contact information.

Just looked at our bills. We’ve spent 2100usd at this restaurant past 30 days, that’s more than our monthly grocery expense.

As a fellow restaurant professional, I believe that a business is in trouble when its staff prioritizes leaving early over customer satisfaction. We sure will no longer be visiting this restaurant that we have patronized for many years and cannot recommend it to others due to the lack of sincerity and respect.

Dining out should be an enjoyable experience that includes mutual respect and a pleasant atmosphere, which is sadly...

I love Ishoni. Been here plenty of times before, along with the Bellevue location and the food and meat quality never wavers. However I was pretty disappointed with our experience last night. I made reservations for 6 and we ordered a few apps, 4 ishoni rice, 3 meat combos, pork jowl, and a 10.5 oz A5 Wagyu steak. After our apps, we received only 1 meat combo and the pork jowl before waiting 15 minutes and for our server to ask us if we wanted to add anything else to our order. We told her we were still waiting on the rest of our order. When we finished our two other combos that finally came, our server in training switched up our grill and accidentally knocked over our small tin of melted butter into the grill and caused a grease fire. I get it, things happen. But then after she replaced it with a new grill she promptly added our steak without allowing it to heat up. She also constantly kept on moving it and flipping it which caused it to lose most of its juices and cook with no char. Another server came by and noticed she was cooking it wrong and ended up taking over and speaking to her in Mandarin, (which I understand little of) about what she was doing wrong and what she should've done. I'm just a little disappointed that I paid $158 for something to be cooked improperly and handled by someone that didn't know how to do it. Of course trainees need to learn at some point but it shouldn't be at the expense of good customer service, our safety, and an expensive A5 Wagyu steak. Lastly, they gave us the bill before we even finished eating and before we got our dessert (2 sesame pannacottas, which are delicious btw). When I set my card down the total came to about $480something and some change. When I got my card back, tell me why the total changed to $506.xx. I know it was a different total because we received our bill before we even finished dinner. I gave them my card only after we finished dessert and the 2nd set of receipts I had to sign had a time stamp of just 4 minutes prior. I'm assuming they forgot to add the dessert on the initial bill, but to charge my card without informing me of the price change is shady. Also, all of our ishoni...

Ishoni proved to be an excellent choice for a celebration, leaving me incredibly satisfied. Parking in Cap can be a challenge, as usual, so opting for an Uber, bus is preferred. Folks even use the parking lot across the street, though a bit pricey, can be worthwhile. If you are considering Ishoni make a reservation, they do walk ins but just help them out.

We made a reservation so we had no wait time upon arriving. Now, onto the main event - the food. I couldn't resist trying almost everything on the menu, and I must say, there were some standout dishes. The Pork Shoulder with Spicy Miso had just the right amount of kick, and the Beef Don Bowl was a delectable treat. The Beef Short with Rib Karubi was another winner in my book, each bite killed it. However, The true baddie of dinner was the A5 Truffle Sandwhich. That sandwich made my night.

As long as you communicate to your server your taste you should be more than fine with their recommendations.

I would recommend the Beef combo for a taste of the menu, and add from there if you are unsure. I usually take photos but since the food was so good, we ate first, gramed later, (doesn't happen often). This is an experience I would recommend again. S/O to Miao for being so patient with us.

Anyways this barbie is full of love after eating...