Sawa Sushi — Restaurant in Sunnyvale

This restaurant seems remarkably polarizing, so I won't get into the he-said/she-said scrum. For sake of comparison, suffice to say that my wife and I have eaten at Michelin-starred restaurants throughout the world, and have also enjoyed omakase at several locations throughout the Bay Area. We are not always impressed by the foam and what-is-that-thing cutting edge techniques like molecular gastronomy. At our hearts, we're comfort food folks and we appreciate that focus over presentation or obsequious service. This restaurant is all about the food. If you go in thinking about anything else, then this isn't the place for you. It is not a cookie-cutter omakase destination where the quality of your meal is solely delineated by the freshness of the fish. Chef Sawa takes risks and uses the highest quality materials combined with his own creativity and expertise. It is a unique experience where my wife and I continually marveled that we had never had fish presented in such a way. Neither one of us tend to care for uni, but the uni that was presented to us was creamy and fresh to where it made us think of a perfect oyster...which was then combined with toro and caviar to make a mouth-feel that we're still trying to put words to describe what the nature of such a wonderful and unexpected combination could be. We had a scallop with a light, spicy sauce that had us picking up the plates and literally drinking the sauce after. There was a salmon spinach, kampachi lightly cured w/ salt, medai, the aforementioned toro w/ uni, and a never-frozen bluefin dish. We went with open eyes after reading all the reviews; in our experience, Chef Sawa was quite polite over the phone and via text, and was an engaging and humorous host. Considering that he uses such high-end fish, it makes a lot of sense that he would require reservations so that he knows how to make sure to have enough without wasting anything. We enjoyed our time very much and are looking forward to finding another special occasion to visit again. Thank...

(First off, Steve let us know that he's pretty good about matching reviews to recent visitors, so Hi Steve!)

If you're in the mood for sashimi (and really kids, that's what Steve is all about), this is nirvana. Like many of the best places (Matsuhisa (LA), Sushi Nozawa (now Sugarfish in Studio City) & Ino in SF), greatness is made in equal parts from the personality of the itamae and the quality of the fish. Steve has both, in spades.

Sawa is the kind of place where you go and trust completely (it's an omakase shop for a reason). Those that don't tend to write crappy reviews because they don't understand that good fish is like good art of any kind -- the artist knows what works and you should trust them to their craft and STFU.

In short, if you're looking for the kind of 'American sushi experience' we've become accustomed to, where users can pick and chose what they want, and art gives way to customer preference & price, you're going to hate Sawa. You'll also hate Sawa if:

1. you like form over substance, or decor over cuisine (this is not a sexy-looking place);
2. you're an idiot who asks for things like California rolls and that 'spicy tuna handroll';
3. you forget to make reservations (he'll probably yell at you);
4. you get annoyed when the craft remains somewhat opaque;
5. you don't like sarcasm.

If you're not in that group and you go with an open mind & reservations (he very carefully crafts his fish purchases to likely demand -- meaning all the fish is extremely fresh and little goes to waste), a good group that's curious and engaging (2-4 people) and the understanding that sushi orgasms are in fact real things, you will love Sawa. Steve's sake selection is also second-to-none -- and just like good wine, it really does make...

Disappointing was the best word to describe my experience. I showed up with an open mind. I've been to a few omakase sushi dinners both in the states and in japan and I knew this one was non-traditional. I had 5 total plates and 3 of them came at once. I found that two of the 5 plates were exceptionally good and showed what his concept of sauce driven sashimi could do. the others were either incredibly clumsy or somewhat bland. I dined alone which is usually a trick to get outstanding service at high end restaurants but I felt ignored and i noticed that other diners had things that I wasn't offered (beluga caviar and some other interesting bites) despite the fact that I was never asked any questions about different tasting menu options. It's one thing to disregard traditional japanese hospitality and edo style sushi, it's another to disregard a customer and knowingly cause a negative experience without attempting to make it up to them. 180 dollars for 2 good plates and three mediocre ones is terrible. Save your money and get a reservation at a real omakase place

Not to mention that steve sawa apologized to me directly and said "next time it will be better." If you really felt that I was having a poor experience then why not try to improve it by offering more plates or a discount. Instead you expect me to "try again" when the meal costs 180$? No thank you, for only 40 dollars more I can go to Manresa. This place is a joke and honestly the portions are too big for this kind...