Kabuki Japanese House of Steak

I can’t comment on the food because Kabuki lured us into their reataurant under false pretenses using Groupon and then adding stipulations that were not indicated when we purchased the Groupon.
The manager wanted to force us to order California rolls and 6 other rolls… for 2 people. We left and went to Kashin! They never disappoint! Don’t waste your time at this place… go to Kashin!

We went as a family of four on a Saturday night for an early dinner around 5:30. When we arrived, there were a few other people waiting but not too many. We were told it would be a 30 minute wait to which we agreed to. Time passed, other families came in, and they seemed to have no reason or rhyme in how they sat people. They sat some people after a few minutes and others seemed to wait longer than us. After 40 minutes of waiting, and me asking how much longer, we were finally sat. Our waitress was horrible. The service was extremely slow. The other group at our table ordered two appetizers that never came to the table. It was difficult to get refills of drinks or any response from the waitress. The only bright side to the evening was our chef. He was very nice and spoke to us the entire time. After we ate, of course, again it took forever to pay. From the time we arrived until we left, we were there for 2.5 hours which is just ridiculous! Not sure that we will be back.

I almost did not go to this hibachi grill because of all the bad reviews I was reading, but I am so glad I did! The food was delicious, their was a ton of food for a decent price, and the servers were friendly! I highly recommend this restaurant and will be going again myself very soon.

I’ve been coming to this restaurant for years! It’s hit or miss DEF though. Currently they have a living social though that is a steal. It’s $ 59 for $ 100 and that includes alcohol. You can sometimes enter a discount code though and even get 15% or 20% off that $ 59.
In any case, we decided to go to Kabuki for an early Birthday dinner for me this previous Friday and use my living social.
The service was terrible. I always wonder how they stay in business because we were at a 10 person table with just another couple and they already had their salads and soup by the time we were seated and this was Friday around 7.
The food is always delicious but our server was so slow. At least she apologized 3x. One time by saying that she had just gotten a second table. A second table? There’s only 4 of us at your first table and the chef is doing all the work.
I would only go if I had a living social or groupon. Kanki is super popular for a reason. ;)

To start things off, I created a Unilocal account just to review this restaurant. The worst Japanese/​Sushi restaurant that we have been to in Raleigh. We came on a slow Monday night. After being seated without menus, it took 15 minutes to realize no one had greeted us. I had to find the hostess again and ask if we had a server. Another 15 minutes after ordering just a water and beer to receive those drinks, and 40 minutes after that to receive our food. There were less than 5 tables of customers in the restaurant. We hope we don’t get food poisoning tomorrow morning.

I gotta say, I came in to Kabuki In a good mood, left feeling unwelcome. At first everything was fine. The food wasn’t awful
Although the sushi was really not fresh as most people haven’t mentioned (probably explains why they’re the only restaurant with half off the most expensive rolls). What really got to me is the fact that although we stayed 10 – 20 minutes passed closing, there were others near us too, and although I don’t like to make people wait as I have worked at several Restaurants and stayed passed closing, I just was appalled at how the mood of our waitress changed from nice to «hurry the hell up» she brought our check without us asking which wouldn’t be terrible if she didn’t keep checking on us eagerly to get us to hurry up. In fact, she saw that we hadn’t put out credit cards out yet and she stood there to basically announce we needed to. They turned off all the TVs even when we were still eating… This was Maybe ten mins past closing (940 PM). She just wanted us out, and coming from someone who’s worked MANY customer service jobs, that’s never okay. We didn’t hold them up as many people were in the same area with the same servers and chefs. They were being impatient and rude, and like everyone else said I’ll be going to Kanki from now on. If you’re not well known compared to a big place like that, plus you’re in a hidden area,
It’s probably not the best idea to basically push yours guests out the door.

Empty restaurant at 2 pm and we had to stand around waiting for someone to realize we had even walked in! We get set at the hibachi and then tell the waiter we are only interested in sushi. So he asks us to move to another table. Then we attempt to order sushi but the roll I wanted they wouldn’t let me order unless I ordered a second roll from the same sheet. Despite the obvious lack of communication with the waiter, he went to check if I could order just one roll. And he came back with a «no.» We asked for the manager but decided that the health department rating (93.5) and the lousy service wasn’t even worth a complaint. We scooted down to Tasu and got better service and probably better food.

Took my daughters to Kabuki for dinner, was told it would be 30 minute. Ok no problem. 20 minutes into the wait some, but not all the power in the restaurant goes out. They assure everyone they can still serve in the part with power and there is no need to leave. The grills are all working. 20 minutes go by. I check to make sure. Hostess says we are at half capacity but will seat you shortly. 10 more minutes go by, I check gain «you’re next». 10 more minutes go by the Hostess then tells everyone they can’t serve any more and are closing. No Manager. No we’re sorry, please come back, here’s a coupon or discount for wasting your night and misleading you for the past 40 minutes. I can overlook the power outage — they couldn’t have controlled that… but the Customer Service, or lack thereof? They had complete control of that.
With Kanki just a few more miles up the road, I cannot think of a reason to go back at this point.

Service was very good. However, the main reason you go to a restaurant like this is the experience of the chef preparing the food for you. And, it was absolutely dismal. No special tricks. The food was horrible — a complete novice who had no idea how to do anything. Save your time and money — go to a Kanki

The sushi I had was very good, so was the squid salad. I went with 4 other girls and they all liked their food, and the hibachi looked tasty. The older gentleman serving us was very attentive and efficient. I had a groupon but was unable to use it on my sushi, which was buy one get second one ½ off. Many restrictions on the use of groupons, but overall good food and service. A little pricy even with the specials.

Would not recommend this place to anyone, purchased a groupon and wanted to use it. We should have taken the hint that we should abort the mission when we pulled up at 8:30pm on a Saturday night and it was dead with three cars including ours in the parking lot. But we went in anyway. We sat ourselves in the sushi bar section, the waitress was not knowledgeable on the food at all with an explanation «I’m sorry I don’t usually work over here» then serves our food and forgets silverware… yes excuse me I can’t eat salad with chop sticks. The dressing for salads they have 2 to choose from ginger and ranch??? The ranch is like water, the clear soup was very bland also like water. To top it off when refills are brought to us the tea that was brought had dish soap in it which we absolutely loved the taste of (insert sarcasm here). The food portions were not very sizable compared to what I have gotten elsewhere for sushi and loved the 75.00 bill. Of course no comps were offered even with the dish soap sweet tea from the looks of it they can’t afford to, since the can’t afford a dish washer to properly rinse dishes. Really I recommend seeking another sushi place before going here.

Fun atmosphere whether you’re going as a group or date night. The chefs give you a show while cooking and they give you their full attention.
The food speaks for itself. I always leave full and with a to go box. Doesn’t matter if it’s just vegetables, rice, noddles or the chicken– it’s all good.
Definitely two thumbs up.

Steer clear…
Very different than other hibachi/​JSH places… I walked away hungry!!! I went with visiting family and everything seemed normal, and then… They had a roaring floor fan next to me blowing freezing December air on me so I was cold and left out of the evenings conversation. The floor was disgusting. Chef was average and unenthusiastic. Then for the icing on the cake? When the last course of mediocre food came around I couldn’t believe it! I have never walked away hungry from one of these places. I am a healthy weight adult with a normal appetite and I was left hungry! The bill was typically inflated and gratuity was automatically included in the extorted amount! I will probably eat Japanese/​hibachi again but NEVER at Kabuki!

Went here when it first opened, absolutely loved their sushi boat-​sushi for $ 50.
Came back again and everything was a bit fishy.
Got food poisoning from their sushi. Never again.
Ever.
Would not come back, ever – especially from a sushi place

Came here on a Friday afternoon for lunch around 1:30 PM. We were seated right away. They stop serving lunch at 1:45 PM and then open a couple of hours later for dinner. For less than $ 10 you can get a hibachi meal. The restaurant is beautiful with a nice water fountain in the front. They also have a separate section for a sushi bar. The server was very attentive as he filled our big cups of hot green tea a few times. I wasn’t sure if the soy sauce had gluten in it, so they prepared my meal separately and brought it in when everybody else started eating. The chef was pretty talented and put on a little show at the end of his cooking. The salmon was tasty and my husband’s steak was a good quality. Will be back. Great for groups.

We went for sushi and sat at their sushi bar. After sitting down, we should have left or moved to their hibachi area, but we thought we’d give it a try. They had a sign saying 50% off their sushi, unless you had a Groupon or Living Social deal. That should have been the first warning. The second warning should have been the empty sushi area. We were the only ones there other than the sushi chef. The third warning should have been how all the sushi items were in plastic wrap, no vibrant colors, and didn’t look very fresh.
Service was very slow. Sushi rolls were small in comparison to their $ 13.99 price/​roll. Only ordering 2 rolls each between my wife and I, we spent over $ 50 for what amounted to very little. The sushi was in fact, not 50% off. We expected quite a bit of food for that price, but we were very disappointed.
I do not recommend coming here for sushi. Their hibachi may be better, but honestly, this was one of the worst experiences I’ve ever had. Because of the bad experience, this place made me think I really do need to share my reviews online, so others don’t have to go through what we did.

Not even sure where to begin here.
We made our reservations two weeks ahead of time for before 7pm. Well while we are waiting for our reserved table for an hour, my nephew cut his finger on a broken glass table in the lobby! We asked the staff for help and got a band aid and no apologies. Should have left at that point.
We waited for our servers for another 20 minutes. We were treated with dirty glasses and GREEN TEA SERVED IN STYROFOAM TAKE OUT CUPS? Then soup with enough spoons for half of the party because they ran out of spoons…
Ok so we stick it out. The chefs did a great job and entertained the kids. No complaints. The food itself tasted old. Two people ordered sushi and did not get it until after everyone else was done eating. Yikes. The staff was flustered quite simply. We tried to order a beer during dinner, of course that never came. We were polite and they apologized often, but it just never worked.
The management was not helpful in resolving the issues either. I blame all of this on the management for overwhelming their staff and not being organized. We tipped our waiters because they tried but were just too flustered.
Also as another user pointed out, the place was very dirty. Hire some more staff or close down!

My family always eats at Kabuki for Christmas Eve dinner — not quite sure how it turned out to be a family tradition… but it is. This year, service was slowwwww. It took the waitress forever to bring drinks/​refill and to bring the soups/​salads. I think she must have been new because she seemed very flustered.
Our chef was great! He was very funny and even accommodated my daughters egg allergy — woot. Did the standard tricks — nothing we all haven’t seen before, but he did them all well.
The appetizer of shrimp was a little well done — but I’m blaming that on the chef taking extra time cooking my daughters rice with no egg, so no fault there. They forgot one of the filet orders but the waitress did bring it out for us. The food was delicious. Besides the shrimp, everything was cooked perfectly with the right amount of seasoning. My mom said it was the best filet mignon she’s had anywhere — thats a big statement. The scallops were cooked perfectly.
We didn’t notice til the end of the meal, that there was no chicken for my husband/​daughter. He ordered the steak and chicken so at least he did have the steak and we just dealt with it but it was kind of a bummer.
My daughter loves looking at the fish as well. I didn’t smell a dead fish smell as others have noted. Didn’t use the restroom so can’t comment on that.
We did try two kinds of sushi rolls and for the life of me, I can’t remember which ones they were. They were both good, but not the best I’ve ever had good.
We will continue to frequent this restaurant as I think it is way more intimate than Kanki in Raleigh. If service/​communication from front of the house to back of the house was better, I’d give more stars.

We were a bit skeptical based on the reviews, but Kabuki delivered as expected. It wasn’t crowded, the show was satisfying, and the chef seemed to be enjoying himself. The food was good, there was a lot of it and we got our Onion Volcano.
I had scallops, my son had chicken, and my husband really enjoyed his salmon. I’d return here!

I LOVE hibachi, but not this place.
There was a groupon so some friends and I thought we’d try it out at lunch on Sunday. We were sat immediately upon arrival however didn’t see our server for 12 minutes after being seated. When she did arrive, she was easily the worst waitress I’ve ever had. No personality, no welcoming vibe, no drink refills, no suggestions, no attention.
You get to choose from salad or soup. Of our group ²⁄₄ chose soup only for the horrible waitress to return to tell us they had ran out of the ingredients for soup, did we want salad? No, no salad. We asked if we could substitute for a serving of carrots added to our meal. She very, very rudely declined with no reasoning, just no. It was lunch and we were within the first 5 customers of the day and you ran out of ingredients!!!
Our cook was decent, however severely over cooked our ordered medium ribeye to well done. Can we say extra chewy?
Save yourself from this place and spend the extra $ 5 a head and go to Kanki at Crabtree. Groupon or no groupon we will not be going back.