Tabento

Well, we came in today and it is no longer sushi bar but noodle place, they will change the name to AOKI NO CHUUKA soon. So, we tried their noodle with sea food, pork and rice, we are so impressed and it was such a pleasure surprised!!! For sure we will come back for more :)

Cute little local spot with a very outgoing sushi chef!
The sushi chef was singing 80s songs very loudly and proudly! It made for interesting entertainment during our dinner haha.
It wasn’t crowds at all when we came on a week night. I ordered the sashimi platter and the fish was alright. Not as fresh as some other places I’ve been. Idk, overall just average. Not sure if I’d return.

Have to try their cha shu bowl!!!
It is just AMAZING!!!
Service was good friendly staffs

Went here for a quick solo dinner, I had the Panko crusted spicy tuna from the happy hour menu, and a Philly roll. The Philadelphia roll I felt was rather pricey. It was around 10 $ which is the most I have ever paid for it, however, the quality of the fish and taste did make it worth the price. The spicy tuna roll was pretty good, I am not use to eating fried rolls but this hit the spot. I left spending less than 20 $ and got my sushi I fix.

Came in because of the sea urchin croquette but ended up very disappointed. I have high expectations on this place since people were talking about how great this place was and the restaurant itself looked quite fancy.
Came in on Saturday at noon, didn’t see any customer there. Hmm. suspicious, because you’d usually expect sushi places to be packed, especially during lunch hours. But it was Saturday, so I should’ve expected that.
Came in and was seated inmediately. I looked up on the board for the daily specials and they had poke bowl, which looked very appetizing. So we ordered the poke bowl, spider sushi roll (if i’m not mistaken), salmon skin hand roll, chashu bowl and some sashimis. They didn’t have the sea urchin croquette anymore. MAJOR DISAPPOINTMENT Right here! After we ordered, I looked back to the sushi bar where they placed all the fishes on display. The fishes looked so sad and depressing.
Anyways, poke bowl came out and it was great during the first bite but when it came to the fishes, they cut the sashimi way too thick to the point where it became too overwhelming.
For the sushi roll, they put the sweet sauce on top of it, which I thought was way too sweet and for the filling, which if I remember it right was soft shell crab, the roll barely had the soft shell crab.
Chashu bowl: the chashu itself was great at first but the more I ate it, the chashu was tough and it didn’t seem like it was cooked at that very moment, maybe it’d been a day? Also, it has way too much rice.
Overall, I was very disappointed with the experience I had here. The only reason I gave 2 stars was because of the chashu bowl. The total that we spent for these was $ 93 (tip was included). So not worth it. I’m not mad, I’m just sad.
Disappointment level: 95%

Such a treasure to find this little place on Unilocal based on good reviews. Unbelievable value as we would expect to pay twice the price for the freshness and quality of what we had tonight.
Large, beautiful, creamy, sweet, dreamy uni from Santa Barbara as well as live abalone. I trust the sushi chef completely as his recommendations of abalone, halibut were incredible. Lucky to have found this authentic, fresh, local Japanese restaurant hidden in a little shopping strip nearby. Looking forward to becoming regulars if it’s consistent… we hope!!!

Tasty. Reasonable deals, very fr3sh good service would definitely recommend, gonna try the ramen next time

My friends and I have been looking for good sushi places around costa mesa and we finally found it! The fish was super fresh the uni was sweet and creamy. I highly recommend this place for sushi lovers

Love this place! The sashimi is as fresh as can be, and the chefs are awesome. Friendly group with an authentic Japanese atmosphere. Try it, you’re gonna love it.

I food was great the service and the m
Charge was far. Thank you I will come back again

I’ve been here a few times. I always sit at the bar, they have a variety of options. The chef is a great guy and its always worth asking what the food fish of the day is. It’s a great time and great atmosphere. I would recommend this to anybody who enjoys sushi and beer in a fun atmosphere.

I have the miso soup with clams and it was expectacular! Salmon and chicken tabento boxes are good, service is ok their cucumber salad is in the small side for the price, their salad dressing is very good very similar to benihanas

Meh, less then impressed. Came on a Saturday afternoon for lunch and took a Russian Roulette roll to-​go. It was pretty quiet inside with just one small family there.
The Russian roulette is spicy tuna with avocado. I felt like the roll was heavy on the rice, spicy mayo and Sriracha and skimpy on the fish and avocado.
Granted, I’ve only tried one roll, maybe their happy hour would have worthwhile options. Otherwise, I probably won’t be coming back.

This is our favorite sushi in town, it is small restaurant but the sushi is so fresh and sooo yummy!!! We ordered chef favorite: Yar yar bink roll; and yellowtail, albacore, salmon, unagi sushi, spider hand roll, spicy hand roll.
The chef and the staff are very friendly!!!
Our kids love love love sushi here!!!

Tabento is located in a shopping plaza among other small businesses and is not immediately noticeable but is more toward the right of the square. For dinner they open promptly at 5:30 and you’ll have to wait outside if you arrive a bit earlier. While waiting my friend and I checked out their happy hour menu that is posted on their window facing the street.
We were the only ones in the restaurants for a while and were greeted by the sushi chef and server. We started with some cold sake and a bottle of sapporo and kirin. The sake was $ 3.75 and the beers were $ 2.50. Their happy hour drink prices are pretty good! We were curious about the spicy fish quesadilla — only in California would you get a Japanese/​Mexican fusion — which was also on the happy hour menu for $ 5 so we decided to start with that.
The fish was… fishy? It surprisingly meshed well with the cheese and when doused in lemon juice was pretty good. I could’ve used some hot sauce as well. It wasn’t what I typically expect of a quesadilla with a meat in it. Usually carne asada and chicken give the quesadilla more of a solid and chewy taste but the soft fish was around the same texture as the cheese and was different, but good.
Next we had the Russian roulette roll which consisted of spicy yellowtail and avocado with slices of orange peppers on top. As spice fiends my friend and I were excited to read in the sushi description that one of the sushi pieces would be far spicier than the rest. We proceeded with a bit of cautious but mostly enthusiasm. I found that most of the spicy seemed to come from the pepper slice and not the sushi itself. In the end we both thought we’d had the spiciest piece and never really figured it out. The fish tasted pretty fresh but I wasn’t in love with the overall flavor.
Our final order was the crunch roll which is quite different from Russian roulette as it’s not as simple in terms of ingredients. It has crunchy tempura pieces all over the top of roll, tasty sauces surrounding the sushi and shrimp tempura stuffed inside. It was a nice balance to the more simple, spicy Russian roulette. I kept eating pieces from each back and forth and was satisfied with our choices.
The service here was fast and friendly. I love that they played R&B hits. We walked in to KC & JoJo and walked out to Mario’s Let Me Love You. They have a decent happy hour menu and prices but the sushi isn’t part of it. I would come back for drinks and appetizers but not necessarily the sushi as I felt that the options were limited — most of them were stuffed with a California roll — and a bit pricey for the quality.

My friend and I come here a lot to have lunch or dinner. It’s quiet and nice. And it’s used to be good. My friend comes here more often than I do, so often to the point where she knows the owner. The both of us have moved since.
We recently came back about 5 months ago, and we noticed that a few things changed. There’s a new owner and there’s a drop in their quality.
Their chicken terriyaki and miso soup don’t have that unexplainable taste in them anymore. It has just become another small japanese place on the corner. Service isn’t as good anymore and the overall quality has just dropped a lot.
I wish the old owners would come back.

Though I used to love this place, as my previous review will tell you, Tabento has been lacking in service and quality the last two times I’ve been here. I don’t even have the heart to come back.
Tonight, we ordered 5 items. After receiving the first three, the server and sushi chef completely forgot about us. After waiting forty minutes, I said screw it and asked for the check. The server brought the bill with four items on it, one of which I never received. I brought this to her attention, and she nicely went to correct the error. She brought out a second bill which still charged me extra, but I was so eager to get out that I just paid it and bailed. It wasn’t even busy… I think the chef was just overwhelmed or something. Not sure how you manage to keep your customers satisfied when you have one sushi chef who can’t even handle four tables and one server who can’t get her ish together on a Saturday night during prime time.
This in conjunction with Tabento always running out of items on the menu and an overall drop in quality is leading me to say «good riddance.»
Kinda bummed, because this is the second time that one of my favorite sushi joints took a downhill turn.

I’ve been to this place to times and I can tell that food tastes good. However, they have some real service problems, first time they basically forgot two of our orders which was ok since we were already ok with amount food we had and also we got there during happy hour but the waitress didn’t even provide a happy hour menu until we ask that if still it’s happy hour!
The second time I ordered a hand role and asked to add crispy shrimp which basically was adding a single shrimp and they told me it’s gonna be additional 2.50 and when I asked for soy paper for same role they added another 1.00 $!! So a single hand role costed me 11 $!! I personally didn’t find the prices reasonable cause it never happened in any other place before!
Overall I assume this was my last visit to this place since the food was not something special and also prices are not reasonable at all!

Tabento is one of my local favs and I love that it’s a diamond in the rough. Hidden in a strip plaza away from the main street, Tabento is a quaint, family-​owned restaurant with a lot of gems on the menu. I’ve been here countless times, but this is my first having omakase!
As always, they ask if you have any dislikes. I usually say, «Do as you please. I am ready for anything.» The chef nods, chuckles or asks, «Anything?» I give them the green light with a thumbs up, nod and smile. So, yes. Let the games begin!
We were presented with this beautiful sampler — Steamed Cod Nigiri, Mentaiko with Grated Daikon Radish and Yamakake Tuna.
The mentaiko (spicy cod roe) was such a burst of flavor as a whole. The grated radish was a nice touch and added to the textural experience.
The nagaimo (wild yam) was chopped instead of grated, so there were a lot of things going on — crunchy, sticky, slimy paired with the tender tuna. It was the first time I’ve ever had nagaimo like that so it was definitely an amazing start!
Even though we just had tuna, we were given another by itself. I’m not the biggest fan of tuna because it usually has a very metallic taste, but this was indescribably good. Smooth in texture, light sweetness, great flavor with none of that metallic taste.
Yellowtail. Hamachi. Good as usual.
Shrimp. Something I would never order on my own, but it was nice to have. It was actually nice to have something cooked with a bit of chew to separate the soft textures in mind.
Sardine. My first time having this. Reminds me a bit of Aji (Spanish Mackerel), but less fishy and a bit tougher. The ginger added some aromatics to each bit.
Uni & Hotate with a bit of Masago. Two of my favs at once! It’s like he read my mind.
Kama. I’m not sure if I heard this correctly, but if it is, this would be the cheek, WHICH IF I’M NOT MISTAKEN, is a pretty tough piece to get. It was so so so tender, I savored this bite way more than the others.
Spicy Tuna with Crispy Rice. Fresh out of the fryer, the crispy rice was hot. I was busily taking pictures, but my friends chomped on the whole piece. I learned from their haste and cut it in half before consuming.
Tamago. It was good, but I feel like I’ve had better. It wasn’t too sweet, which is what I like. The chef left us end on a good note, but asked us if we would like to try anything else.
Got another order of uni (so yums!) and chu-​toro. The toro was melt-​in-​your-​mouth perfection/​tenderness. Such a nice gradient and with that, our meal came to an end.
Sometimes the best days are unplanned and you decide to just go with the flow of things. Who knows where your next adventure will take you? Take a chance! Now go out there and enjoy yourself!

Tabento is a quaint spot hidden in a plain shopping complex. Parking is plentiful and the restaurant itself seats a modest 20 – 25 people with less than a dozen seats at the bar. The menu is fairly simple and consists of unique kitchen dishes such as uni croquettes and shishito tempura, basic nigiri, sushi bar specials, and a handful of cut rolls.
We decided to sit at the bar and opted for the sushi sampler which consisted of shrimp, albacore, yellowtail, tuna, and salmon. Super fresh and clean tasting fish with a slight kick of wasabi hidden underneath every piece of nigiri. We also decided on the spicy tuna atop of crispy rice with a drizzle of mayo dressing. The tuna wasn’t very spicy and the bites of deep fried rice were absolutely delicious. Definitely a savory combination. i was craving scallops and ordered the Tabento roll. The simple roll consisted of slices of fresh scallops on top of a California roll and a drop of Japanese mayo.
Tabento is quite the hole in the wall but they serve a bevy of fresh fish, Japanese tapas, and sushi specials.