Okaeri Sushi Hibachi — Restaurant in Town of Monroe

I used to enjoy this Hibachi/ Sushi restaurant- but for the last two years I’ve noticed a marked change. The food has deteriorated and the quality of service has also changed. The quality of the food has become just lackluster. The hibachi rice is often hard and crunchy. The last time I went- the eggs were burnt. The food is now becoming under-seasoned. A general disappointment.

But my main issue is the service. The waiters -especially the waitresses are very rude and dismissive. They don’t pay attention to your requests- often bringing food much later than requested. Their attitude towards patrons is awful-as if customers are bothering them. I can’t understand it.

Tonight I took my son for his ninth birthday simply because it’s a community restaurant. It’s a place that I’ve gone too many times in the past and my son said- “I like the noodles.” I was hesitant because as I said - the service has become sub par.

So I hoped that tonight they would obviously have better service. Well I should have gone with my gut. Tonight was another disappointment. Everything was rushed. Hibachi rice was awful. The noodles were also a miss- super oily. My son didn’t want. I had to ask twice for something I ordered earlier.

The worst was that after TWO reminders that my son was celebrating his birthday- they handed me the check and didn’t bring out his birthday treats. Then had the audacity to be upset when I refused to tip. Let me be very clear. Tips are earned. Period. Service needs to be quality for you to receive an additional sum on top of the regular bill. Did I tip the chef? Sure. He was obviously new and tried his best. But the waitresses? Absolutely not! I not will not be going here again. You are better off going to Iron Chef in Central Valley. It’s where I should have gone....

Went to Okaeri for Saturday dinner service. Ordered Sushi Deluxe and Sushi Regular. The presentation was from a culinary standpoint was lazy and insulting. I didn't know if I was served a plate of sushi or an aquarium. They literally put plastic pet decorations on stomped on the plate using cheap wasabi paste as glue. Petco is next door so I assume they bought them from there or Walmart. Not only that, the plastic plant and coral decorations themselves were oily probably from having gone through a dish machine with other plates and cutlery. Heaven help you if a health inspector sees that.

Advice to management, take your fancy white napkins and rub the little plastic ornaments down after you wash them to see how disgusting they are. There's a reason you should not use non-food grade items as decorations especially if you're going to re-use them from customer to customer. Not only are they tacky but they're insulting to anyone with any kind of culinary art experience. The oil and food particles from the group washing in the dish machine binds to the plastic and you're spreading it around on customer plates. It's disgusting.

I'd have a talk with your Chef. Reputation wise there's no excuse for that, it's laziness. I would never let something like that out of a kitchen I worked in. Maybe give your staff a chance to demonstrate creativity and get some passion in there because they seem to have a lot of potential. Make them want to care care. I saw no creativity on my plate. Even if you're going to be lazy, how hard is it to shave some carrots or celery? Plastic fish...

This place used to be a family favorite. We had family visiting from the UK and brought them here for hibachi. We had the absolute worst waitress. She was so rude and impatient. When we called her out and asked her to be a bit nicer or at least smile, she smirked with an attitude, rolled her eyes and then proceeded to ask me dad “what do you want?” I couldn’t believe that this was a person working in the service industry. Distasteful and disrespectful. We truly should have walked right out and not even given them our business. I asked for our waitress to be changed and had much better service from there. However, the whole experience has left such a sour taste in my mouth. The manager never even came out to speak to us or apologize for what we had experienced. When I asked to speak with them I was told “he’s busy.” Not ok. We will never be returning. If you are a person of color I would highly discourage you from dining here unless you are ok with being treated as less than a human because of what you look like. I’m embarsssd to have had my family who was visiting experience such terrible service. Oh and the chef? He continued to make the same annoying “woohoo” noise for the entirety of his time preparing our meal. No actual effort to entertain or interact with us, just “woohoo” constantly. I don’t know if they’re under new management or what but NEVER AGAIN! The food was also sub par and their cleanliness is questionable as there was an old noodle sitting on our grill when we were seated. The chef simply brushed it off to the side and continued to prepare our meal....