Mitsuwa Marketplace

The service here is nothing to compare with the Mitsuwa at Costa Mesa.
They are doing the stamps and the coupon action.
The cashier staff gives too much small talk, she actually talk too much sh! t. When she saw the beef tongue, she talked in a fake Manga voice «that’s big, it’s a big tongue, so so big».
Are you making fun of what I eat?
I almost thought she worked in a sex shop before.
The cashier staff forgot to key in my 5 dollar coupon, she told me that she couldn’t fix it, maybe I should use it next week, but the coupon expires tomorrow. She kept telling me to go to the customer service, then she act like it’s none of her business anymore and she doesn’t explain for us to the managers. She seems like that she doesn’t want to admit that she just made a mistake.
The staff at the customer service weren’t friendly. He gives me 2 stamps when I had 80+ dollars purchase. It was a 25 dollar per stamp, I am not so sure whether he is bad in math or just being stingy.
The manager in Irvine needs more training to be a good manager, until then I rather stay away from this place.

A smaller but equally delicious counterpart to the Costa Mesa location. This Mitsuwa has a Santouka Ramen just like the Costa Mesa one — but what Costa Mesa lacks is the TAKOYAKI/​OKONOMIYAKI place here! I was so psyched when I learned they made that here! Okonomiyaki has been one of my favorite foods since I tasted the real deal in Osaka. I usually get it with squid and shrimp added. It takes a bit longer to order but it is worth the wait. CASH ONLY just like the other locations. They are also conveniently located right next to a Daiso japanese dollar store.

I’ve been buying Japanese food and ingredients from Mitsuwa Irvine for over 3 years now, but I’ve noticed that bentos used to be way better before. Some of the popular ingredients are out of stock for a long time after new manager took place upon Mr. Asada, former manager, left for North Cal branch. The level of quality has gone down… so I decided to go to Costa Mesa and they have more selection and bentos (take out plates) are delicious. I hope Mitsuwa Irvine will have the same taste they used to have again.

Okonomoyaki. Good court too salty I think too much sauce. Here very salty there is no sense here to cook
Around 5:20pm 2÷15÷16

I’ve been here a few times with friends, but I’ve never really bought anything. Recently I came with a friend with a list of things I wanted to buy. I needed Japanese curry, mayonnaise and furikake. This place is really small and sort of cluttered. It wasn’t very crowded, but it was difficult to move around and try to find things since some of the aisles were so tight. In a couple of the aisles there were big carts of supply boxes just blocking the way. Even though I only needed three things we were there for about twenty minutes trying to look for stuff. Also none of the aisles are labeled so you don’t really know what is where.
We found the curry first, that was the easiest thing to find. Then a few minutes later we found the furikake. I liked that they had a lot of varieties of furikakes. I got one with egg and bonito in it. The last thing and hardest to find was the Japanese mayonnaise. We pretty much went in circles a couple times until we finally found it. It was packaged in a bag so it was unusual for mayonnaise, I was looking for the bottle when I should of been looking for the bag. Now that I think about it though, all three things that I got were pretty much in the same area. Maybe I’m just dumb, but it was hard to find stuff. I guess I could of asked for help, but I didn’t really see any staff around. In the end I got my stuff. So far I’ve only used the furikake and it’s the first time I’ve ever tried it. I topped it on some ramen and it was really good, brought some nice flavor and crunch to my dish. This Mitsuwa just isn’t the best I’ve been to.

This is a really neat little marketplace.
I came here with my friends about two weeks ago. One of my friends said that me and the other friend needed to try the ramen from Santouka.
That ramen was quite excellent.
At first, me and my friend didn’t know how to order the ramen from Santouka, but my other friend who knew about this place told us how to order. I ended up getting the soy sauce ramen, which has pork, green onions, bamboo sticks, and like an egg sort of food item. My other friend who was also, along with me, trying the ramen for the first time, got I think char’ su ramen, which is just ramen with extra pork and he didn’t want any of the other food items, such as the bamboo sticks. My friend who knew about this place I think got what I had gotten, which was the soy sauce ramen.
Before eating this ramen, both me and my friend who hadn’t had this ramen ever before had only consumed ramen from Cup of Noodles. But after trying this ramen from Santouka, me and my friend both agree that we won’t look at ramen the same way again. This ramen from Santouka was really rich and had an excellent depth of flavor.
Also, my other friend who knew about this place got me, from the little store right next to Santouka, a mandarin orange juice drink. That drink was pretty good as there were some chunks of real mandarin oranges in the drink.
All in all, this was a spectacular experience going to this marketplace, eating the exceptional ramen, and drinking that mandarin orange drink.
From what I experienced, I would recommend this place to anybody wanting a taste of real ramen, and to see some of the many Japanese products that can be found inside this marketplace. I am sure that both of my friends would recommend this place to everybody too.

I love going to Mitsuwa back at home, because I absolutely love the Japanese culture (and of course, the food.) This mitsuwa’s a lot smaller than the one I go to back in San Jose. It’s small and sorta cramped when it gets crowded. The dining area, with my all-​time favorite Santouka, is a nice seating area and sit down dining place to eat at. It gets crowded during peak hours, but of course that’s because it’s so yummy.
Yeah. This Mitsuwa’s a lot smaller, but it still does its duty.

Fantastic place to grab food, so many food options. Was cool to walk around and peruse the grocery section as well. I had the Ramen soup and it was delicious. Reasonably priced.

This review is based on their little ramen eatery. I got the spicy miso ramen with pork rice bowl. I thought it was okay. The soup was pretty greasy and the poor was greasy too. It made me feel kinda sick and gross afterwards cuz the broth is super salty and the pork was fatty and greasy. Every time I eat too much pork I feel kinda gross. I couldn’t finish the ramen cuz it gets really greasy and salty towards the end when you keep eating it. Probably won’t be back.

This Mitsuwa market is much smaller than the one in Costa Mesa, and the selection isn’t as great. But the store is always organized and clean, employees are always courteous and polite, and you’ll be able to find any essential Japanese products and food you might need.

The best Japanese market I’ve been to. Very clean and friendly.
Loved the selection of items. Books, films, music, tea, bakery, a lovely food court, sushi and sushi grade fish for homemade sushi, fresh produce, snacks, Mochi, household items, etc…

This Mistuwa is my go-​to Japanese market since it is the closet to me. It is significantly smaller than other Mitsuwas but still has a food court inside along with a bakery and some other small shops.
I love love love Japanese snacks so this is where I get most of them. It kind of sucks depending on the time you go though. A lot of the time, especially weekends, pretty much half of their stock of everything is gone… particularly snacks and ready to eat foods like sashimi and bowls. Sometimes it’s the same when you go after 6pm.
Their sashimi and bowls section has a really good assortment and they’re always stocked on fish that you can just buy in blocks and cut yourself.
My other favorite part of this place is tarako and mentaiko. They come from the frozen section but they’re such a good price and they taste delicious!
The staff is always friendly and sometimes make conversation as you’re checking out.
I remember one time I asked if they had dried scallops and the lady I talked to gave me suggestions on where I might be able to find them.

Customer service has improved. They’ve been told to smile. =D *ping!*
ROYCE’ Chocolates has come and words cannot describe how phenomenal that is.
Hamada Ya is still serving amazing desserts along with soft serve matcha (thumbs way up).
Inventory seems to have increased in terms of variety.
Store is still clean though at times I’ve noticed it to be a bit disorganized, but this might be due to the increased traffic as a result of the insane compact housing develops going up at break neck speeds (rant saved for another review — Irvine Company).
Parking lot is still maddening.
Marukai (now called Tokyo Central) has exploded and might be putting the hurt on Mitsuwa, though I doubt it since there are 20 minutes and a freeway and a nightmare off ramp (405/​Harbor) in between.
I don’t live nearby anymore but I still find myself thinking about coming here since the only «Japanese» establishments in my new neighborhood carry names like «Tokyo Love» and «Geisha Roll.» (shudder)
At any rate, do your grocery shopping at Marukai and come to Mitsuwa for quick stop convenience and snacks because almost everything «everyday» here is $$$$.

My new favorite Japanese grocery store! Has everything you need and then some, on top of that they have fresh chutoro (blue fin tuna) and ohtoro (blue fin belly) on the daily, and extremely fresh! Clean and not as busy as the Costa Mesa location. They also carry fresh produce, and very unique Japanese items that you can’t find anywhere else. Chutoro runs about 69.99 a lb, Ohtoro runs 79.99 a lb, I also got uni which was 50.00 a lb.

I reviewed Santouka (in the little foodcourt) separately, which I also love, but the real reason I give this place 5 stars, despite its not being perfect, is that almost 6 years after I visited Japan, this is the only Asian market in the US that I have yet found that carries my beloved Seaweed Potato Chips! It also has many fresh and easy seafood/​sushi-​type options that are changed daily, and sells bento boxes (so convenient, so cool)! I would not say that it has the best or largest selection of Asian food items typical to most Asian grocery stores, but since those are so easy to find, especially in Irvine, the fact that it has the hard-​to-​find items is what makes this store such a gem! Plus, they have Ramen in the food court. I can’t not give this place 5 stars.

It’s pricey but I go for the ramen and Japanese quick fix foods.
Don’t forget to bring cash

It was first time going to a Mitsuwa market. The layout of the market was nice and organized. Pretty easy to follow and find things. The A/​C felt really nice. The workers were very friendly. They greet you and smile. What can you do? You greet/​smile back at them and feel good. The food court is a great place to have lunch. Very affordable. If you plan to eat here, make sure to have cash because it’s cash only. It was my first time eating ramen there. They made my food so fast! It tasted delicious. I’m definitely going back.

Ok… I don’t write reviews as often, but when I do, I’ll try to make it juicy.
If you are looking for quality and freshness, this is it — .if y’all from the south, this is like the Asian version of Publix… but it is quite pricey though. unless you are getting mushrooms and other asian produce or herbs, Sprouts/​Trader Joe will be a lot better.
Now here are some of the deals that you can get…
Already made food section — they have riceballs (onigiri), bento boxes, sushi sashimi at a good deal… normally they run out… but if you are lucky enough, they mark it all down starting around 6:30PM…as for onigiris, they might only have umeboshi (soured plum), but if you are lucky enough, sometimes you get the good stuff — like mapo tofu bowls, katsu bowls and sashimi…
Nato — japanese fermented beans, acquired taste, but they have many brands… and they rotate brands selling them from 79 to 99 cents for 3 packs… it is almost always there… I really don’t see the difference in nato brands…
Beers and spirits — they have deals some times, like small size Asahi being cheap, and have other kinds of japanese sake’s, which I think it is cool.
Not your superstar Mitsuwa in Costa Mesa… but does the job…
and damn it Unilocal… stop trying to correct my grammatical errors… sometimes it is more efficient in getting your point across… and english is my 2^nd language.

Not as awesome as the one in Costa Mesa. But I noticed in their food court, they have a ramen place that looks almost identical to the ramen place there. Didn’t have cash though so we couldn’t get food. Beware: cash only food court always.
As for the selection of groceries, it was slim pickings. Luckily we were just stopping in to get some sake and beer, which we found. I couldn’t find edemame, had to settle for a frozen bag. oh well.

We made a trip to the Costa Mesa location last weekend but the parking lot was jam pack and full so we made our way down to the Irvine location.
First impression was this place is tiny. They don’t have much fruit or veggies. Everything is packaged in really tiny portions. I dont know if we came on the wrong day but it seemed like everything was out of stock or super over priced.
It really was a huge waste of gas driving over here and they didn’t have what we wanted.
I don’t recommend the Irvine location. Costa Mesa is the best.