Samurai Sam’s

I have been going here a lot recently. The food is really good. If you get a chance stop by and check it out sometime.

I get #3 (the wrap) dark meat. Always fresh & tasty. Most importantly this place does not salt me out. I rarely eat out because I hate drinking a gallon of water after.

Alas… I wish my 100^th review could be a better one… Yakisoba bowl, large naturally with beef and chicken breast… customary veggies broccoli, carrots and I believe what was once zucchini? and topped off with a teriyaki/​sriracha sauce.
Disappointed…by the time I got to my destination maybe a 4 – 5 min drive this food was stone cold, not good and it gets worse! So we’ve started with cold food now let’s introduce the meat section. the chicken was decent the beef was barely cooked and way too chewy… it’s not going good here folks. The noodles were probably the best component of this unhappy family.
This is the thing here. Good sized bowl of very plain jane tasting food topped with an overly sweet sauce. As I was eating this thing strangely the taste seemed very familiar to me… yes, it tasted exactly like my «late nite eats» frozen teriyaki bowls stashed in my freezer.
Damn it… I need a new quick serve «bowl» eatery in my life.

I visited this place for lunch at 1 PM on Tuesday. I ordered the beef and chicken bowl with white meat, brown rice and mixed veggies and spicy teriyaki sauce. The vegetables were a little limp as though they had been sitting for some time. My brown rice was flavorful and well prepared not overcooked or undercooked but just right. My steak was good but the chicken was dry. The spicy teriyaki added a little flavor but didn’t take any attention away from the other ingredients. It was a good recipe with poor execution. While everything else about this visit was four stars, the bowl and most important part of the meal was subpar. I’ve been here before and remember a pleasant experience so I’ll have to give this place another try.

I really actually quite enjoy this place. When I come here I usually get a bowl with just the mixed veggies and dark meat chicken and regular teriyaki sauce. Soooo yummy. I can’t eat much rice but for the first time today I got the white rice bowl with dark meat chicken and broccoli with carrots.
I had to wait a few minutes for fresh broccoli to be steamed but everything had such wonderful fresh flavor I loved it!
I would skip the egg roll though it was soggy and had a weird flavor!
If you are in this part of town give this place a chance! You won’t regret it.

The food is healthy — and tastes it. A good alternative to other Chinese fast food chains.

I read the reviews before I went in. All was good, had the combo bowl, large with veggies, chicken, beef and brown rice. It was pretty tasty and filled me up. However, I was not impressed by the egg roll, it was dry and didn’t have much flavor. The place was clean and busy. It was a healthier choice than regular fast food. I would go back again.

The shrimp rice bowl I ordered was delicious. Shrimp was tender and sweet. a good match for the awesome sauce. The steak was bangin too! I think I’ll try the spicy sauce next time. The staff (especially the manager) are extremely accommodating and super, super nice! Fast service and a good choice of beverages at the fountain. Definitely will be back! :)

This visit marked my first and only time to try a Samurai Sam’s. For $ 8 – 9 you can get a small bowl of under-​cooked meat with way too much sauce on it. The atmosphere is unremarkable inside, so you certainly buying the ambiance. You’re better off with your average Panda Express or mom and pop Mongolian place than eating here. Disappointing.

I’m not that fond of this restaurant for chicken teriyaki. The chicken wasn’t real yummy and the noodles could have been more special and the $ 9 price seemed a little high for it and a soda. I’ve tried this restaurant twice.

Great food! The staff is so helpful and attentive. The wait time is usually less than 3 minutes.

I really like this place. You get what you pay for. Now the reason that I will not give it 5 stars is because I think that the chicken breast meat is usually more on the dry side.
With that being said, the staff is really friendly. The portions are fair and nice. The dark chicken or the sumo rice bowls are awesome.
GET THE SPICY TERIYAKI, it is so good. Then add sriracha just because it makes everything that much better.
Buen aprovecho,
Joseph

Things seemed to be cooked fresh here but I didnt think the price equaled the amount of food i got. I had to get a snack once i left. Also the grilled egg roll was a big fail to me. it had no crunch, wrap was chewy, and had an weird taste. They seem to be a healthy japanese place so maybe baked would have worked better to give it a little crunch. Id go back if someone wanted to got there but i wouldnt go out of my way for it again

Can-​be-​healthy fast food in Fresno. I stop by occasionally when I’m visiting town and get steamed vegetable with chicken breast. It’s good, simple, and pretty cheap.

I’ll leave it to Unilocal to summarize my review: «Meh. I’ve experienced better.»
If you’re in desperate need of a rice/​veggie bowl fix for lunch, this place will do. Otherwise, I’d hit up another chain (i.e., Panda Express). The veggies tend to be watered down and soggy, and the chicken overly salty and/​or dry. The saving grace is the bottle of heaven (a.k.a. Sriracha) they have handy at the soda station.

Came here for the first time today despite the not-​so-​good reviews.
I was pleasantly surprised! Everything was delicious and fresh. I opted for steak, white rice, broccoli and regular sauce and added on 2 potstickers as well. The broccoli was fresh, not overdone. The steak was perfectly seasoned and not «rubbery» at all.
I would definitely come back here and plan on it!

Those people with their ‘oh my god everything is under seasoned blah blah’ crap…
This is like subway. You know, you’re supposed to eat healthy. I doubt they add salt to their meats or veggies, but their sauces are not low sodium so splurge in that. This is for people who can pick and choose their bowl however they want the healthy way. It’s true however that it’s often a hit and miss with their steaks, either perfect or too chewy, but overall I think it’s a good place to grab something different to eat other than subway.
BTW there is such thing as sauce on the side. And extra sauce is no charge.

Solid 3 you could say. My experience and review, I’m realizing is pretty much in-​line with Roy K.‘s.
Yes, it’s a build-​your-​own-​meal type of place which is pretty good, without taking the concept overtly too far (like Great Harvest Bread Company and their damn ‘order form’). Choose your size, rice, veggies, meat, and sauce — not too complicated at all. They only have about 3 — 4 options for each of those categories. (Great Harvest however — will have about 8 — 10 options for each of their 8 — 10 categories, literally. Sorry, but I’m just recently coming off a shitty experience here and can’t help but to still be thoroughly annoyed at how tedious just ordering a sandwich is there.)
Anyways, I went with a dark-​meat chicken and steak rice bowl with the Japanese mix veggies, and spicy sauce (not spicy at all).
I agree wholeheartedly with Roy K. Veggies were too soft and overcooked — no ‘bite’ and texture at all to it. Plus, they seemingly have no seasoning, not even salt. The chicken also, as Roy suggests, pretty fucking bland. It greatly pales in comparison to a «Pete’s Teriyaki» type of Japanese fast-​food chicken that is actually very tasty, fresh, and well-​cooked.
However, the saving grace of this place, is the steak. It was very tender, almost as if it was a filet cut of meat. They even cook it to a medium rare — medium temperature which is very nice to see for a ‘fast food’ restaurant. I could visibly see the pinkness when they were slicing it fresh in front of me, which is also another added plus you could say. Again, from everything else that was average, the meat was clearly a winner — seriously very tender. It’s actually shocking to see and taste steak like this in that environment.
Other than the food, the service was ‘ok.’ There was one employee who was preparing the meal for the lady ahead of me, dude was a complete MESS! He was droppin’ shit, misusing the cutting board, had to keep going back and forth to the kitchen for ingredients, etc. etc. — he just seemed really unorganized and flustered; wouldn’t be surprised if he was new. It was funny to watch actually, the customer was clearly noticing and looking very uneasy.
Thank God that dude didn’t make my order.
My server was clearly more organized, packing my bowl nice and clean — not a mess like the poor gal in front of me. As good as he was though, overall the service wreaks of being ‘new,’ which would make sense since they are not that old (Jan 2010); just very unpolished and almost awkward service. Not a huge deal really, just had to mention.
If I come back, i’ll just obviously choose steak only — perhaps you should do the same.
In conclusion, Sam’s is not bad. I wouldn’t drive across town to come here, but If I’m starving and in the area, then I wouldn’t mind coming back. They just really need to figure something out with the bland veggies and chicken. Again, based on just that alone, it was surprising how well-​prepared the steak was here.
Decent 3.

I really enjoyed the food. My wife and I ordered a Sumo Bowl (chicken breast, dark chicken, and beef) and made it a combo by adding a drink and grilled egg roll. Total $ 12. We couldn’t even finish the meal. There were 4 sauces to choose from and it made the food pretty tasty.
It’s not the best but I was very happy with the service and clean environment. Healthy food that tastes good is hard to find. I will go back again for sure.

Its ok for a rice bowl chain.
Here’s how it works,
Pick your meat, Pick the size, Pick type of rice, Pick type of veggie, and Pick type of sauce.
Had the large White Chicken w/​brown rice, Japanese mix veggies and sweet chili sauce.
Veggies could have been a little less cooked. Chicken could have been more flavorful (btw its like they boiled the chicken, its BLAND by itself). Brown rice is brown rice. and lastly the sweet chili sauce is nice but would have liked more of a kick.
overall it was a ok tasting bowl and filling.
does give you an alternative to subway (which is next door)
The best way to describe this place is true Americanized Japanese fast food. Don’t think you are going to a real Japanese restaurant. It’s a rice bowl place.
Ok if you are in a pinch and you don’t want to wait in line at other rice bowl places.