Kyoto Japanese Restaurant — Restaurant in Town of Amherst

The Hibachi Chef Stabbed and Burned my Fiance with a Hot Metal Fork.

I have never in my life had a more disappointing customer service experience in my life than the one that I experienced tonight. If there was a way for me to make this 0 stars or less I absolutely would.

My fiance and I took my Mom to Kyoto for Mother's Day, our reservation was at 7pm on 5/13/17. Our chef comes out and is very energetic and fun, he quickly goes too far with one of the other patrons spraying her with water to the point where she gets visibly upset and her boyfriend asks him to stop, which he does.

Everything goes fine for a little bit, he gives me my steak and my fiance goes to take a piece of steak. He juts the metal fork forward catching her in the side of her finger, it didn't break skin but it was extremely hot. I hadn't realized what had happened until my fiance left in tears. I went outside and consoled her and came back in to speak to a manager.

The woman at the counter went and got the woman who was stated to be the manager. I spoke to her at the front and she did not offer any apologies, her only concern was injury liability. She wanted to know if we were going to the hospital and they would pay for it, which good, they should do that. However it didn't seem bad enough for the hospital, it was a painful burn but something that could be treated at home.

She told me she would discount the meals or at least that is how I understood the conversation. I told her that comping the meals was fine as far as I was concerned, the night had been ruined and we just wanted to go home and get some aloe for the burn. She brought us boxes and confronted the chef in front of me, he asked me where she went and I told him that he had stabbed and burned her hand and that's why she left. He did not apologize either.

The manager packed up my fiances dinner as I and my Mom packed up our own respectively. As we were leaving she grabs me by the shoulder and tells me I have to pay the bill. Apparently all she was comping after our evening was ruined was my fiances entree. Not the appetizer she ordered or anything else.

They burned her, brought her to tears, did not apologize, ruined our night with careless and frankly dangerous behavior and they expect me to pay for the service? If I mess up with a customer's account at work I take that on myself and I remedy whatever the issue is free of charged because it was on me. That is standard.

I got irate because I was apparently under the mistaken understanding that they were comping our meals, mostly because when I said about just comping the meals the manager said yes. Perhaps it was an issue of the loud noise and the language barrier. That though is another thing that is not really my issue to solve, I suggested a remediation, the manager agreed under a mistaken understanding of what I said evidently, and then stopped me to pay for the bill which as far as I knew we had already discussed me not paying. She argued with me in front of other guests and then when I offered to just give her the food she told me no, that I have to pay for it. I handed her all the food, refused to pay for any of it and left.

We have had dinner there more times than I can count, we have friends that go there at our recommendation and I can say with safety and certainty that we will never be back and we'll advise the same of anyone else that we speak to as well.

This was the worst experience I have ever had in any establishment of any kind in my entire life and that is not an exaggeration in the least. This could have all been easily avoided at several points. The chef could have responsibly prepared our food without jabbing at patrons with a sharp, hot fork. The manager, chef, or both could have apologize to my party but specifically my fiance. Our meals should have been comped as this was gross negligence on the part of the chef. I don't think it's too picky to want to go out to eat, pay money, and not expect to be stabbed and burned by the person preparing your food.

I would love if the owner would...

My adult son and I went for sushi lunch. We ordered from the lunch special section of the menu, pointing at the menu to the waitress to show what we were ordering. We chose the $16 sushi roll option and the $20 sashimi assorted 10 piece option. We then chose 10 pieces of sashimi, once we even lost our place and asked the waitress how many pieces we had ordered toward our total of choosing 10. The sashimi arrived and it was only 3 different types of sashimi. We thought, this can’t be right, but then a minute later she brought the rest. The food was quite good. Then the bill arrives and it says EIGHTY DOLLARS for lunch!!!! She charged us $20 for the assorted sashimi lunch special and then charged us again for all the sashimi separately (which was an extra $50!!!). I told the waitress that she had made a mistake and we ordered $36 worth of food. She yelled at me and dismissed me. “No, the sashimi special is CHEFS CHOICE, and then you ordered all that extra sashimi also”. Say what?? No no no. I showed her the menu and asked where it says CHEF CHOICE? It did not but she continued yelling at me saying that we are all the food and need to pay for it. The boss guy comes over and yells at me repeatedly CHEFS CHOICE, CHEFS CHOICE. Whoaaaaa. If the menu doesn’t say chefs choice then I assume I can pick my 10 pieces. We yelled back and forth for a few minutes and I told him that I am paying him $36, not $80. He kept yelling at me, “I understand! I understand!”, to which I replied “if you understand, then how about you say words that match with what I’m telling you!?” We’ve all eaten at restaurants and whenever there’s an up charge, the server tells you that right up front. Again, I can’t emphasize enough that we were CLEARLY pointing at the lunch special option and were CLEARLY choosing the 10 assorted items we wanted. She never said that we were ordering extra items. Never. I’m the end I paid him $50 including gratuity. And I’ll never go back again. The way they escalated the situation to yelling after I calmly explained that there was a mistake makes me think that this was intentional and I do NOT appreciate that as a customer. Anyway, if you choose to eat here, watch out for the bait and switch when your bill comes. And be prepared for them to get hostile if you...

This is a delayed review. I went to this place on a Sunday afternoon a few weeks ago. I had a hankering for Hibachi and the place I usually go on Delaware closed down. So this place seemed to be the next best thing. It's in the suburbs so parking isn't garbage and the reviews seemed solid. It wasn't terribly busy. We got seated at a booth as it was the three of us and sitting at the flattop was overkill.

A disinterested host/server seated us and handed us menus. I ordered the Hibachi chicken and shrimp, so did my wife and my son ordered noodles. To my surprise, our food came quick which was a bit odd. Freshly made hibachi usually takes time. To our dismay, we found out why it came so fast. The rice and veggies were barely hot like they were reheated. The shrimp and chicken were overcooked, which is typical when they're reheated.

WE WERE SERVED FOOD THAT HAD BEEN SITTING THERE AND THEY REHEATED IT.

Hibachi should be steaming hot right off the grill. I've never had reheated Hibachi even from takeout joints.

To add insult to injury, the portions were tiny. I realize that food and labor costs are high, but as a restaurant, you don't raise prices AND skimp on service and portions. My wallet was $80 lighter that day and I felt like we got screwed.

We didn't even get a chance to complain because our server barely checked on us. She was very inattentive and barely interacted with us. I expect this type of interaction in a hole-in-the-wall Chinese restaurant in the hood, but not at a sit-down establishment.

I'm relatively new to the area, but this place made me hate this city a bit more. The Japanese restaurants back in my hometown were always pleasant experiences with very kind and attentive staff.

Kyoto Japanese felt like a restaurant in it's death throes. I expect it to close soon. Maybe I'll come back to pee on it's grave. Thoroughly disgusted and offended. I won't repeat my nickname for this place because it's offensive. But it fully encapsulates how I felt we were...