Maru Plus Japanese Restaurant — Restaurant in Tucson

Saw the restaurant on an Instagram ad, thought it looked really cool and went to check it out. Bought multiple things on the menu to give the place a fair shake, but was met with disappointment.

First the atmosphere is awesome, it's a very chic new age design. The hand painted wall was very impressive and the other bits and pieces worked well together.

Second the cleanliness of the restaurant was severely lack luster. Multiple tables were left dirty the entire time we were dining in. The silverware is left by the defunct soda fountain and it's a free for all. Multiple forks and soup spoons were visibly dirty with food, grease, and other oddities left on them. So if you don't mind using dirty silverware that's been touched by unknown people prior, then this is the place for you.

Finally the food, the focal point of a restaurant. Everything brought out to the table was cold. I honestly couldn't tell if that was actually supposed to be the norm or not, because it was never mentioned while ordering or on the menu. We tried the pork katsu and cucumber salad as appetizers, karaage curry, and the tantan spicy pork ramen as entrees. The pork katsu was the highlight, it was very salty but the katsu sauce was nice and sweet giving it a good balance. The cucumber salad was the second best part of the meal, which is sad considering the appetizers were the highlights. The karaage was the palest karaage I've ever witnessed. The karaage had a "barely there" soy sauce flavor, so it mostly just tasted like chicken. I would easily vote the karaage as the worst I've had in my entire life. The curry and rice was also absolutely bizarre. The curry sauce was finger frigid and the rice was luke warm. When mixed together it barely had any heat at all. Yet again I couldn't tell if this was the intention, as some places will do a cold curry, but I was never led to believe that to be the case. The curry tasted the exact same as a golden curry packet from the store, so you can save yourself the trip for the curry. Finally the ramen, the biggest enigma of the entire trip. The cook had somehow managed to make it both cold and hot, and honestly it was bizarre. The entire top layer of the ramen was frigid and the bottom layer was warm. I believe the pork and additional toppings were put in cold, the noodles put in hot, and the sauce was luke warm. Making it a complete mess. The broth tasted good, but the noodles were store bought, and the pork didn't add much flavor.

Overall the entire trip was a massive let down. Between the cold food and the poor cleanliness I highly doubt I could recommend this to anyone except for...

The food is good, but the service is so slow that the food can't make up for it. I came and placed a takeout order at 8:00. There were four couples at four tables in the restaurant, two of which had yet to get their food in front of me. I waited over a half hour to get my food, and, worse, a couple that came in after me got served before me. This restaurant simply isn't prepared to serve sushi.

Kerp in mind this is sushi only. Ths hot kitchen is separate and may be better. But the sushi chef is overwhelmed and can't keep up.

EDIT

This is in reply to the owner's response below:

Why don't you start making changes rather than excuses? Maru's slow service is literally highlighted in your Google reviews. Do you realize what you sound like?

Q: Why did your restaurant fail? Bad location? A: No. Q: Bad food? A: No. Q: Then why? A: When everyone wanted to give us money for food, we weren't able to give them the food.

You say you checked the orders and everyone ordered sushi simultaneously, but then also say that the people who ordered after me yet were served before me got hot food? Those two things can't both be true. Also, you're wrong: They got one sushi dish and one hot dish. Your overworked sushi chef made the decision to make their sushi dish before mine because their hot food was ready and he did not want it to sit and cool while preparing my sushi.

I didn't yet mention that after I had sat for 30 minutes plus and even politely told your cashier that I was leaving the restaurant to go home, drop off groceries, and come back, upon my return that cashier left my finally completed to-go order sitting on a prep table with only napkins left to go in the bag in order to take a new order at the register. The sushi chef noticed this, ran out from behind the counter, dropped napkins in my bag, and handed the bag to me with an apology.

None of this is a criticism of any of your staff. It's your job to train them and set them up for success, but you are failing.

I usually don't leave poor reviews for local restaurants, and that is because I want them, like you, to succeed. But at this point, I feel like it would be a better idea to open my own sushi restaurant in the empty space two doors down from you and hire the staff from your restaurant after you inevitably forfeit their jobs through your own...

So, the name Maru+ was always intriguing to me because it looked authentic Japanese. The menu online looked amazing . As soon as you walked in, a sign said to order your food with the cashier. So we go up never being acknowledged. Waited around and saw the cute Japanese items you saw if you were in Japan. My girlfriend thought it was cute. Good menu options. Finally, the sushi maker comes around and grabs a tray with some hot Ramen bowls and then says "hey I'll be right with you." Cool, so now we know we are not being ignored. Then we browse the menu options, and my girlfriend orders the Veggie udon bowl, and I order the Shoyu Ramen bowl. He tells us where we can get our water and help yourselves to the fixings sort of like a taco bar. A serve yourself type of deal. I thought they were cool. Then we sat down and was sort of confused because I didn't know if we would be forgotten or not, which thankfully we weren't. But as we sat and waited, I noticed a few other people waiting for their food as well, so so much for a quick meal. All in all we waited and I couldn't help that the other people were still waiting for their meal so I started to get concerned. Because that means our food would take even longer. Our food finally arrives after about 12 minutes or so. I was not timing them. Soon as the food arrives last waitress goes okay "Veggie udon and she has a blank stare and goes"i don't know what this is and I go "Shoyu Ramen bowl" as I take the bowl from her instantly cause I'm famished. I look in the bowl and go" gosh I hope this is Shoyu Ramen" because it didn't look like what I had ordered in the past at other Japanese Ramen noodle spots in Phoenix and Tucson area. I started to question if I got the right stuff because the soup was bland and not to my liking. I asked my girlfriend how she liked her bowl, and she was like it's the soup. The base is not salty enough. My noodles and veggies have no taste. I agreed and said I feel the same, the char siu had burnt ends and not like your typical pork belly. I devoured my food and fought through the tasteless meal because I was hungry, and I had already spent $53 + $8 dollar tip. My girlfriend didn't even finish her meal, we left disappointed. I don't think I'll...