Ajito

We were kind of familiar with this place because my brother’s friend owned the restaurant that was here before Ajito. Thought the reviews were pretty good so we decided to give it a try… however, we had wanted to try their Yakitori (skewers), but these are only served at dinner time. Oh well… no biggie… it was already 12.45pm, and judging from the place being totally packed and there being a wait (with a sign up sheet), their lunches must be pretty good too.
This is a pretty small, very basic restaurant with very minimal decorations… then again, when the food is good you really don’t need any fancy decors as a distraction… at least this is my experience anyway.
To get straight onto the food… a nice and very polite young server came and took our order… the menu is not huge, but there’s a good variety of yummy looking dishes to choose from… either from the lunch menu or on the board with a dozen or so daily specials. As appetizers we ordered the Chicken Karaage and the Fried Pumpkin Balls (croquettes, as the server called them). For mains, I ordered the Curry Fried Chicken Katsu over rice, which comes with a miso soup and a small dish of pickled vegetables. My brother ordered the Sashimi Salad and my father ordered the Grilled Eel over rice.
I must say that everything was perfectly cooked and very yummy… in fact, my father is big fan of grilled eel and he will have something to say about it whether it’s good or terrible… when asked how his grilled eel over rice was, he replied that this was the best he had ever eaten… and he made it a point to compliment the server too… which the server was very happy and excited about.
I’m not sure about dinner times, but because this place was so crazy busy at lunchtime today, the servers were having a hectic time rushing here and there trying to take care of everybody… and I must commend them for doing such a great job! Yes, it took a bit of waving down to get my green tea refilled, but our server was so polite and friendly that you just had to let it go.
I guess I would have liked to keep this little place a secret so it wouldn’t get too overcrowded at meal times, but I guess it’s now too late.

Great place for groups for a night of eating and drinking. Came here with a group of 9 and all had a blast.
We ordered:
** 2 x Salmon Avocado Tartare
2 x Yakitori Set of 6 Skewers (breast, liver, gizzard, heart, thigh, wing)
2 x Scallop Skewers
2 x Grilled Whole Squid
** 2 x Shiitake Mushroom Skewer
Beef Tongue
** 2 x Sashimi Salad
Yaki Udon
Oyako Don
Unagi Rice Bowl
** Salmon and Roe Rice Bowl
** Genmai Cheese Risotto
** must orders
Everything else was good, but not OH EM GEE good. I’d come back here again. Fairly priced and service is good. Japanese people are so nice: o)

Food is not bad. Actually it is pretty good for the standard of Japanese food in Cupertino. Of course, if you compare that with, say, Japan Town in SF, it would be so so. The real problem is that the service is really poor as a Japanese restaurant. It takes forever to flag someone down. Not that the staff is ignoring you. They are just running around looking busy.
Food takes forever to come. We came here twice so it was not an one off occurrence. For the first visit, half of the order would come in 20 minutes and the rest of it would take another half an hour. For the second visit, the second half of our order never came. We waited and waited and seeing them serving people who came after us. We had done waiting and left hungry.
If you are not in a mood of waiting an hour for your food, this is definitely not the place for you. If you like to drink and alcohol is your thing, this place is pretty good because I saw drinks were served very quickly.
Definitely won’t come back again. For the time I have to wait here, I can almost drive to a nice Japanese restaurant in SF.

This is my favorite Yakitori place in the area. They also have a good assortment of small plates and creative Japanese dishes. It’s a great place to take a group of friends after work or on the weekend. Definitely a place worth knowing about in the area.

3 ½ stars if Unilocal allowed it! This place is pretty good! Had called in during lunch hours to make a reservation for dinner at 6pm to be safe.
Ordered:
Skewers: We ordered several skewers. They were out of pork belly unfortunately. I felt like these skewers all needed a touch of salt in my opinion, a little on the bland side. or maybe I’m just a salty person. Chicken skin with sauce was my favorite! No extra salt needed on that one. The spicy chicken meatball really packs a punch in that sauce. It was kind of a kick at first bite… then it spread like fire in your mouth. If you like spicy, I’m sure you’d enjoy it! The chicken breast skewers come with a sauce on the side and a dab of a pepper paste of some sort. I wish they gave more than just a dot of it! Also some of these skewers came out nice and hot, some came out lukewarm.
Hot Pot of Eel: This was yummy. Very warm and fresh tasting. The eel was tender and the rice had crispy bits. Good eel to rice ratio~ The egg was poached well and oozed nicely when popped. I kind of wished the rice was seasoned or salted, but that’s just me. Boyfriend liked it the way it was.
Chicken Karaage: the portion is not huge or small. Good amount for two people to share, enough for a bite or two for 3 – 4 people. Came with a mayo sauce, lemon wedge, and some broccoli. I like to sprinkle that spicy ramen seasoning on my karaage.
Garlic Fries: the portion here was more than I expected. It’s definitely more than a Mc D’s large order of fries. Came with a little cup of ketchup. I like to mix my ketchup with a lot of pepper, which they conveniently had tableside.
Service was nice and prompt over all. They provide you with a warm towel to wipe your hands after you are seated. Food comes out relatively quick for yakitori, or maybe since we came when it just opened, food was barely starting to roll out. The dining area smells smoky, but wasn’t as physically smoky as some other japanese yakitori places I’ve been to which was nice. We left feeling full and content. Spent about $ 60 before tip on two people.

Hidden away in a strip mall across from Home Depot. Authentic Japanese place. The have a good selection of yakiniku and yakitori.
The food was good. The portions are small — you only get one skewer per order.
Pricing is on the high side based on the portions. Service was OK but could easily be much better.

I miss Red Crane, but Ajito seem to have what I was craving for at the moment. However, the execution was not up to par.
We ordered:
–Daikon mochi agedashi = Bland!!! I should have just ordered agedashi tofu instead. Hmph!
— Skewers = different types and some are chewy as heck. I want better meat quality!!!
— takoyaki balls = a standard appetizer that I usually would order.
— Garlic French fries = random, but we wanted some.
— Pork belly = with an egg. Not as tender but still easy to eat.
— Smelt fish = decent amount and simple.
— Genmai risotto = HORRIBLE! Tasteless. I’m very disappointed because I heart risotto.
I like the service at Ajito, but the food was rather disappointing. Can’t say I wouldn’t give this place another try. After all, there are so many places to choose from.

So excited I found this place! NO MATTER WHAT YOU DO MAKE SURE TO GET THE STONE POT EEL BOWL. If you love crunchy rice, you will love love love this dish. The stone pot keeps the dish hot throughout the meal and your rice get’s crunchier and crunchier towards the bottom. Ajito gives you a really generous amount of eel and tops it all off with an egg cooked to perfection. My other friends ordered the katsu the spicy cod roe gratin which were all equally delicious in their own right.
We also ordered 6 kinds of skewer but I actually didn’t enjoy the yakitori and as much as I enjoyed our individual dishes. For someone who likes really heavy flavor and sauce, I felt the yaktori wasn’t marinated as well as I would’ve liked. If you do like lighter flavoring to your meats you will probably enjoy this dish more.
Note * The restaurant is fairly small so try not to come during busy dinner rush hours to avoid the wait. Either way, definitely come here and try the food. I know I’ll be back for sure!

Came here for dinner on Saturday night. I had made a reservation 2 days in advance, but when I arrived, they couldn’t find it. Regardless, they put a table together for us and had great service.
The Anikimo, chicken skin and rice ball were awesome.

I came with two friends for dinner time. There was about a 20 minute wait on Saturday night… honestly not bad at all. There’s a menu outside that made me question my life and why I felt so indecisive. Everything looked and sounded good! Anyway, once we get seated our waitress comes over and asks us for our drink order. The service was top notch and very nice. Almost to a point where I feel bad because the service was so good. We ordered the 6 kinds skewer and our own entrée. I got the chicken and spicy cod roe gratin. The skewers were so good. The sauce was perfect and I loved the chicken hearts the best! The gratin was amazing as well. Very cheesy and delicious. I definitely recommend getting it. The place is nice and cozy, the only downside would be that there were too many options and it made my life difficult but that shouldn’t be something to complain about. Overall great restaurant and I will bring more people here to try!

REALLY good. Gizzard and liver skewers tasted amazing. Chicken skewers were really soft and the miso soup really tasty. We’ll come back to try the more dishes! The only things is that the restaurant inside lighting is really dark.

Came here for dinner on a Tuesday evening and managed to get a table without a reservation. Halfway through our meal the whole place was packed and there was a line out the door. So I’d make a reservation if you can! And I’d also recommend coming here Tuesday/​Wednesday/​Thursday between 6:00 — 7:30pm for their happy hour.
Ajito’s specialty is chicken – literally every part of a chicken. They make sure nothing goes to waste, so on the menu you’ll see everything from chicken skin to liver, gizzards, and heart. My mom and I were feeling quite adventurous and ordered chicken gizzards, heart, and skin. I liked the sauce they used on the gizzards. The texture was interesting… chewy but every-​so-​slightly crunchy as well. It’s hard to explain! The chicken hearts were deep fried, and I really liked them! They were similar to the gizzards in texture but were chewier. The chicken skin was aite… nothing special. I found it to be super salty, actually. Out of the three, the hearts were my favorite and the gizzards were a close second.
We also ordered some non-​chicken dishes as well. It was way too much food for two people, we had 3 to-​go boxes, haha.
Ankimo: I’m still obsessed with monkfish liver. Unfortunately, the ankimo here didn’t taste super fresh and didn’t have that rich/​buttery flavor. I’d pass on this one next time.
Daikon Mochi: These are deep fried and served in soup. Not bad, but I realized I’m not a big fan of daikon. Really liked the texture though.
Salmon and Salmon Roe Rice Bowl: LOVED THIS. The salmon is incredibly fresh and there’s a good balance of salmon and salmon roe. Highly recommend this dish.
Salmon Skin Salad: Not impressed. It was just salmon skin, so the texture of the salad was really weird (in my opinion). Also a little bit salty.
All in all, the chicken dishes here were my favorite, along with the salmon rice bowl. For all that food, it only ended up being $ 60 total, which I think is a really good deal! I’m excited to come back and try some of their other dishes.

If I had to eat one thing for the rest of my life, it may quite possibly be *drumroll* Japanese lunch specials… Which is kind of cheating, since it’s comprised of a changing selection of various sides/​mains. While I appreciate the simple style of Japanese cooking, teriyaki and tempura get realllllyyy boring, Ajito’s lunch specials allow me to sample specialties without breaking the bank over high-​tend Japanese tapas.
Every time I come to Ajito, I am greeted by two sets of daily specials on display, one bento and one tray of little dishes, usually ~$ 13-​$ 15. It’s pricier than Yoshida down the street, but the selection is more unique and almost more of a fusion style (i.e. I can fulfill my tapas dreams, at lunch prices!)
Here are the lunch specials delicacies I have tried:
(++) Unagi don in stone pot: Good quality unagi, accentuated well by the soy sauce, sushi rice, seaweed, and poached egg. I had doubts about the poached egg, but everything came together in a umami, comfort food-​type creation
(++) Gyutan: As tender as pork belly, coupled with attenuated beef flavors. A tad bit salty and heavy on the soy sauce, but overall great rendition of beef tongue
(++) Sashimi salad: Adequate amount of sashimi!
(++) Side salad: Dressing had a kick to it, but I couldn’t quite describe it since I was paying attention to the lunch conversation: X Nice spin to standard Japanese salads of kewpie (naked baby doll brand) mayo
(+) Salmon: Wonderfully melty, but a little too salty
(+) Orange: Why am I reviewing the orange… because they make it pretty and easy to eat! Your hands don’t end up smelling like oranges afterwards
(+/​-​) Chicken karaage: Breading is tasty with some pepperiness, but the chicken quality isn’t quite there; some parts were fatty or bony (unfortunately reminding me of bad experiences with salt and pepper chicken at those terrible skimpy places)
I’ve also tried the $ 13 sashimi lunch set special, featuring a selection of fresh, delicious sashimi. The portion isn’t huge, but it satisfies your cravings for good quality fish.
The verdict? Ajito is known for yakitori, but frankly I’ve never been a fan of overpriced artisan skewers. Lunch specials all the way.

Great restaurant in Cupertino! You can order a ton of small dishes to share among your friends — my kinda restaurant!
Notable items:
Salmon tartar — really fresh with avocado and potato chips!
Chicken thigh skewers — always my go to skewers
Unagi bowl in stone pot — i normally hate eel, but it was pretty tasty here!
Salmon sashimi and roe rice bowl — large portions! Their salmon sashimi was my favorite, and there was a bunch in this.
Sashimi salad — super savory dressing with fresh fish and salad mix!
Pass:
Hamachi Kama — i don’t think they cooked this one long enough. Wasn’t charred enough for our liking!
Pork belly skewers — wasn’t tender enough
Will be back!

I love my Japanese food, and it’s hard to find a great grilled skewer place in this area. Ajito is one of the 2 places I know of here in the South Bay Area where you can find Japanese skewer items.
We came here as a group of 6 with a reservation called in just a few days before the Friday when we dined. They were welcoming although not everyone in our party was on time and sat us with hot towels to wipe down our hands.
The food was delicious. As for skewers, we ordered: hearts, chicken skin, spicy meatball, and spicy chicken wings. The hearts and chicken skin were my favorite. On the other hand, the spicy meatball is fire! It had a real kick to it. The spicy chicken wings weren’t as bad.
The non-​skewer items we ordered were: takowasa (octopus w/​wasabi), sashimi salad, deep fried chicken cartilage, sausages, beef tongue, and grilled whole squid. Deep fried chicken cartilage is one of our favorite dishes anywhere it is served so we had to get it. The sausages were what I believe to be Berkshire sausages which are always delicious. They were served with ketchup and dijon. The sashimi salad, served with their house dressing, had enough sashimi and salad to divide between 3 people. The grilled squid was cooked just right with mayo to dip in. The beef tongue was thick and really chewy. It was one of my favorite dishes here. We also ordered steamed rice and met our expectations of Japanese white rice.
Several of us ordered hot tea while others ordered water. The waiters/​waitresses refilled them quite speedily. The service here wasn’t exceptional but not bad either. I would come here again! Since we came as a group of 6, there was a service charge (tip) already applied to our check which was about 20% of the total after tax.

Just a tiny restaurant in a strip mall in Cupertino… I can see how it can be easily missed…
Parking is right in the front, but I think you have to come early or they will get filled up.
They offer daily specials for about $ 12.95 and it is a full size generous meal. There were 4 of us so we each ordered our own meal and shared. I had the fried oysters which were delicious. There were 5 pieces along with soup, salad, rice and tsukemono. the other folks had the butter garlic chicken and the ground chicken on rice.
People there are really nice and friendly. Service was excellent and food was good.
When I picked up their card, it indicated that they are associated with an online store that offers gluten free rice ramen and rice udon.
Next time I’ll need to find out if they offer it in the restaurant.
Definitely a return to place!

very pricy, but there were A LOT of japanese people dining so it’s legit. Went in yesterday since Go Fish Poke Bar wasn’t open yet… I knew this place would be $$$$$ since izakayas are usually expensive. skewers can go +$ 2.5 each and they’re small so you end up buying more. We sat down and were given a warm towel (おしぼり/oshibori)immediately…don’t worry, it’s japanese restaurant etiquette… just wipe your hands. Tried out several things:
nankotsu (cartiledge): tiny pieces at $ 2.5, I LOVE nankotsu, but pieces were tiny.
chicken breast: plain and dry.
sauce flavor chicken skin: Not sure what sauce flavor is, but it’s flavorful and a little crispy.
ankimo: $ 8.5 for a small piece. It’s cut up into 8 tiny slices in ponzu sauce, wakame, shredded daikon and lemon wedge. I would say tomi sushi has the better value.
soba: enough for 1 person as a meal, but shared. chewy and not too soft. came with grated ginger, wasabi, and grated daikon.
service was nice, but don’t come here if you want better quality izakaya food. For a bit cheaper, try tanto in sunnyvale or izakaya on 6^th street i think… close to first street.
Skewers…for cheaper price and more quantity, my only suggestion is chef yang since that is the only other skewer place I’ve tried. Beijing style skewers: cheaper in price, but more pieces. only problem is, everything is the SAME chili FLAVOR. overall, i love the food here, but it’s pricy. Waiting for my next chance to go. :)

So… although the food was definitely on par or quality for a Japanese restaurant, I was quite sad to see that they didn’t serve skewers during lunch as that was what we were Jones-​ing for. But let’s go over what we ate anyways.
Parking here is in a little parking lot that’s shared with other small stores. I arrived at noon and there was only one other table that just sat down but by the time we left it was almost packed which was around 1pm.
They have your typical donburis and lunch sets. I went for the sashimi set which included an orange, small salad, miso soup, and bowl of rice which went along with 3 slices of salmon sashimi, 3 slices of seared white tuna (I think), 2 slices of mackerel, and two slices of other fish which I couldn’t determine what it was! This cost about $ 13 which is fair for the amount of food you got.
We got a cup of tea, but never got a refill. Good thing we asked for water since I needed something to drink! The servers were nice but were only really attentive when taking away food or bringing the bill.
Overall, not bad for lunch, but I’ve definitely experienced better. I’m still not sure why the grill isn’t open for lunch… still sore about that.

Ate here for Saturday night dinner with the parents after a recommendation from a family friend. Worst mistake ever.
Right when we opened the front door, I smelled that yakitori/​grill smell – the small restaurant was FILLED with this bbq smell. If you’re sensitive to smokey smells, I would advise you to bring a mouth mask – yes, it’s THAT smokey. Arrived a few minutes after it opened at 6PM and the hostess immediately told us that we would have to finish eating by 7:30PM because of the next reservations. That was the first turn-​off of the night! I understand you want to make money and maximize your sales, but keep that information to yourselves!
We sat at a small table next to a couple of large parties, and our server gave us some steamed towels to wipe our hands – that reminded me of my childhood days when airlines used to hand us warm towels on international flights! That was such a unique part of their service that made me smile. The room is very small, I’d say with a max occupancy of less than 50 people. During dinner time, the atmosphere can even be described as romantic/​intimate, but we had little kids in between our table so the environment was quite family-​friendly.
Food-​wise, we started off with the daikon mochi balls (friend’s recommendation), grilled squid, and sashimi salad. After we realized that the plates were on the smaller size, we told another server we wanted a bowl of ramen as well. The Japanese food here is legit, I will hand it to Ajito… meaning that they do lots of small bites and detailed preparation for their food. Ajito is a small business with what I would describe as «well-​crafted dishes» and small bites – I wouldn’t recommend coming here if you were on a budget and starving. Portion sizes here are small and definitely not your Americanized type of sushi place.
Speed of service and organization are the main points I need to highlight during our experience. Our small sake also took a while to be delivered at the start of our experience, and every plate we ordered came out after 5 minutes of waiting… not bad! I totally understand because the plates are created with care and detail from the chefs. However, after we had the chirashi salad and the mochi balls, we sat at our empty tables for a WHOLE 30 minutes until we finally asked a frantic server (there were 4 servers running around the small shop, but none of them would pause to tell us what was going on with our last two dishes!) what was up with our grilled squid?! We reminded him that we also ordered a ramen and kindly asked if he could check the status of our orders. He promptly brought over our grilled squid and told us that we never put in an order of ramen :\ that was a disappointment.
It seems like everybody else here has had great experiences with Ajito, but I’m not gonna sugarcoat my service-​lacking dinner. I was pretty bummed that my parents were not satisfied with this place, and we all agreed we wouldn’t come back here again. Ajito seems like a place for people who don’t mind waiting around for their food, having lots of drinks/​down time with other diners. But if you’re in a rush, or are super hungry… you will definitely be forced to wait and probably wonder what’s up with your orders. Pricing is on the higher side with our salad being $ 9 and small sake at $ 7, just as examples, but I will say that their quality of foods is pretty great. Too bad service that Saturday, and the flow of the experience was totally not okay.

You know it’s a good sign when 90% of the customers are Japanese.
Very quaint and cozy. The waiting area is very awkward because it gets so crowded after the two seats are taken. It’s difficult for people to walk through when there are even two people in the waiting area. There were three four tops open and three different parties waiting in the area so service was a little behind. I think this could have been avoided considering that we all had reservations.
Hot towels are a nice touch.
1. Beef tongue — soft, perfectly seasoned it’s not what I expected tongue to taste like. Texturally it’s like thinly sliced beef.
2. Japanese omelette — slightly sweet, light, reminds me of soufflé because of the consistency.
3. Salmon and avocado tartare — flavor explosion! A must order. Chips are thinly sliced and pair perfectly with the tartare sauce.
4. Tail (skewer) — chicken tail. Not bad considering I have never had tail before. It’s just a little fat and cartilage
5. Breast, wings, gizzards, thigh (skewers) — all boring. I got them salted
6. Liver and heart skewers — love it, especially the liver but I’m a big fan of liver. If you haven’t already had it, I would recommend trying it here because it’s just a small order and it’s pretty smokey and sweet. The liver taste isn’t very strong
7. Monk fish liver — pretty good but I’ve had better.
8. Skin (skewer) — oh hell yeah