Shinto Japanese Steakhouse & Sushi Bar — Restaurant in Strongsville

Expensive, but well worth it.

Shtintos has always been a special place to come for date nights, birthdays, anniversaries, or just to have a good time. Sheng has always taken care of us and you can tell they really care.

The food is amazing. The Rock Shrimp is a MUST! It is crunchy, crispy, chewy, sweet, creamy, with a little bite. The Soup and Salad are good although I wish it had a bit more of the ginger dressing. Of course, the hibachi is amazing. It's all cooked to order and made perfectly. I didn't even get the steak, but watched the chef prepare one for another guest perfectly. To say that the food portions are generous would be an understatement. The rice they give you literally overflows the bowl. When everything was finally on my plate, it was a literal MOUND of food. We ate until we were full AND STILL LEFT WITH 4 TO-GO BOXES!

The service is great. The Hosts are fast and communicative. The Bartenders are bright and attentive. The Servers are friendly and thorough. Of course, every chef does a great job preparing the food and putting on a show, doing tricks, making jokes, and flinging food. Mike Jones is our favorite :) I will say that I don't love they ask you if you want white rice or fried rice but don't verbally tell you about the $3 price difference. You'll only see it on the menu if you read the fine print. The menu also lists a happy hour but not its days or hours. They also ask if you want Shrimp or Mushrooms. I asked for both and was told that's another $4. That would have been fine if I got more than 3 shrimp though.

The atmosphere is of course electric. Everyone is being fed sake, catching food in their mouths, clapping, laughing, and cheering. Even when a table across the room has a fireball good off, you can still feel that little waves of heat. Everything is clean and modern. The music was awesome. They were playing songs by Avril Levine, Kelly Clarkson, Ellie Golding, Beyonce, Coldplay, Green Day, and Sean Mendez. My only gripe is there was a kind of sewage smell coming from the back where...

Every time we visit our family in Cleveland, we always make it a point to have dinner at Shinto's. Today was no different. I called Shinto's at 2PM to make reservations for 11 people at 6:30 PM. I was informed that due to the size of our party, they could accommodate us, however we would be at separate tables. Our complete party arrived at 6:30. At 6:38 PM we were sat at our tables. After waiting quite a while for our server to take our drink order it took quite a while for our drinks to arrive. When they arrived, the diet coke was iced tea so that had to be fixed. We were told the pop lines were crossed. The wine my mom ordered said it tasted like the bottle had been open for a week. We had to ask the server if we could order our food. Finally we received our soup followed by our salad which took a bit of time. At 7:30 PM our cooks still had not began our meal prep. I asked to speak with the manager. She introduced herself and I explained my issue, the fact that we had been sitting for almost an hour and our food prep had not been started. She said she would check with the kitchen to see what the hold up was. She came back to tell us that there were not 2 cooks available at the same time so another table that had been sat after us was being taken care of. She assured us that our cooks would be out in a moment. The manager also tried to tell us that we were sat at 7PM which was wrong. She also explained that because we were a large table that they wanted the better chefs to prepare our food. After a very poor conversation with the manager, we were given 3 free desserts for a table of 11 and then to add insult to injury, they added a 20% gratuity to each of our bills. For a table of 11 our bill total was approximately $430.00. She might as well gave us her middle finger. It will be very interesting to see how readers of the Strongsville Post react after the read this review of Shinto's in...

We had a 5:30 reservation, which they let us know would be cancelled if our party of 14 (and a baby) didn't arrive before 5:45 (apparently every member needs to be present before they seat any party). We had arrived slightly before 5:30, and they kept us wait standing by the entrance until 5:45. After seating us, it took another 15 minutes before they came to ask about drinks. The waitress insisted that the same I ordered could not be served warm-despite being listed on the menu as "served warm or chilled"- it finally arrived warm so I assume that it was some confusion on her part. 20 minutes later they came back to ask about our good choices. Our salads came out 10 minutes later. So we had been there for over an hour before they brought us the first food item. The table was never bussed (dirty dishes and empty cups were left on the very shallow counter in front of us). Water was only refilled after being empty for 15-20 minutes, and they never offered to bring me another sake- while bringing my father in law an unwanted second beer and charging for it. The food was good, but not great- though the chef did put on a good show at the table. The waitress asked if our table wanted dessert while we were still mid way through eating our main course, and apparently decided that she had finished waiting on our table at that point. The bill promptly showed up in front of us as I was almost finished eating (they brought take out boxes to us as we were eating- it was surprising). Then they cleaned the table after we paid, but before we had gotten up from the table- in preparation for the next customers. We left by about 7:30, so it wasn't that we were taking as long time. The default 20% tip seemed very excessive for the paltry service. I won't be back. I'm surprised that this chain is still in business. I assume the reviews which list this place as excellent...