Masa Sushi & Eastern Kitchen — Restaurant in Wilmington

If I wanted food poisoning for Christmas, Masa definitely delivered! The experience was nothing short of a disaster from start to finish. We have enjoyed Masa in the past, and because it had been awhile, thought it would be great for a Christmas Eve-Eve dinner.

We ordered crab rangoons, miso soup, shrimp tempura, a sweet potato/cream cheese roll and the Fire Dragon roll. As soon as my sister was done eating, she was in the bathroom, and had to continue going back multiple times. As for me, I noticed the shrimp was a little off and even bit into something I thought was the shell and part of the line to be deveined. An hour later, I had the worst stomach pain I’ve ever felt. I ended up violently vomiting in no time and was nauseous the rest of the night. The food wasn’t just disappointing; it was downright dangerous.

To add insult to injury, I noticed that Masa has a 94 sanitation rating. For a place that barely squeaks by in cleanliness, I almost didn’t even want to pick up my food — but as a former restaurant worker, I tried to give them the benefit of the doubt. Never again. I also had to deal with a fairly rude bartender who managed to overcharge my card by more than $20. When I tried to address it, she seemed more annoyed with me at first for even bringing it up and her coworker for not attaching my name to the order. It was a pretty uncomfortable position. The other server was incredibly sweet and told me to call back in 1-3 days and let them know if I had gotten my money back from the first transaction. I’m not mad my card was overcharged, I’ve done that to people before by accident, but her attitude was terrible. Not to mention, the app they encourage you to download listed the menu items we ordered as $11-$13 MORE EXPENSIVE than when you call and place an order via phone.

All in all, this was one of the worst dining experiences I’ve ever had. Between the questionable food quality, the unsanitary conditions, and the unhelpful service, Masa will never get another dime of my money. If you're looking for a pleasant meal, do yourself a favor and skip this place — unless you’re in the mood for some holiday...

At 3pm on a Saturday we gave Masa a try. The restaraunt was completely empty which was fine with us! Since coming from Japan I've had a hard time finding truly good sushi, so I thought I'd play it safe and ordered Hibatchi Chicken instead. It came with lukewarm Miso soup. The broth (usually Dashi based) had a really odd flavor and the Miso paste or whatever they used, separated from the broth in a really strange way. The salad was just lettuce with a piece of cucumber, literally drenched in ginger dressing. It was really more like ginger dressing soup with lettuce for garnish! My husband's salad bowl had a big crack and a chunk missing out of the porcelain. We were thier only patrons, if you can't put the bare minimum of finesse into a meal when you are not busy....when can you? The Hibatchi chicken was just salty and meh. I spit out a few pieces of chicken that were off. It did not seem like high quality chicken breast and for $20 it should be. Hibatchi is all about the method of cooking which gives flavor to the dish without having to add a lot seasoning. A little soy sauce, some garlic is normal but this was just a salty sauce with little flavor. The veggies were ok. Portion size was good, even by American standards, but I didn't take my leftovers home and neither did my husband, which is saying something! Our waitress was very nice! Overall, for over $50 for 2 people, it was not worth it. We felt duped. We won't...

As a recent transplant, I’ve been searching for good restaurants here on the eastern coast of NC. I’ve had the opportunity to eat in restaurants all over the US, New York, DC, New Orleans, San Francisco, Toronto to name a few. Suffice to say I’ve had some great meals and I know what I’m looking for in a restaurant, especially sushi. Unfortunately, Masa came up short. I ordered miso soup and a selection of nigiri: salmon, yellowtail, scallop and freshwater eel. This is my standard test of a sushi place because if you can’t get these right, as far as I’m concerned the rest doesn’t matter. The results: the taste of the miso soup was off, weak and lacking something. The scallop nigiri was good, probably locally sourced. The eel tasted good and was served just slightly warm when it should be the last item made and served immediately. But the real miss was the lack of eel sauce. This is the easiest win in a sushi place and they missed on it. The salmon and yellowtail were mostly tasteless which has been a common issue in this area. Lastly, the sushi rice was dried out on the edges like it wasn’t fresh or had been left uncovered. Again, this should never be a problem. Overall, the presentation and service was good but the details that matter were off. So the...