Yamato

Last time around which was awhile ago my experience was fantastic. This time on a scale of 1 – 10 I would say a ⁴⁄₅. I won’t be specific it was just the overall experience did not live up to my own hype from loving it last time.

Ok so here’s my HORROR STORY. It’s 4pm Wednesday evening, I’m passing Livermore. I want to take my girl for sushi, but Yama-​whatever is the only place open at this hour. We sit down and the lady can speak just enough English to take our order, no problem. We order Gyoza, Dragon Roll and chicken Hibachi. The gyoza comes first, and my second piece has a dead fruit fly chilling on it, soaking in the soy sauce. I set it aside and politely show our server. I joke with my girl «certainly there won’t be a fruit fly in the Hibachi, too.» By the time she brings a new plate of Gyoza, I’ve already found a SECOND fly in my hibachi. Again, I politely showed our server the fly and she tried to say it landed in my food while I was eating. No ma’am, it was neatly tucked away into a deep-​dwelling crevice of the a leaf of cabbage, under the rice and chicken. SMH. I cancel the order and send away the plate. Ok, so the gyoza is down, the Hibachi is down. We’re still hungry and I ain’t no wuss. What’s left? Ah, the dragon roll. Happy to have it, I pop a piece. Gross. It’s the worst Luke-​warm sushi I’ve ever had. Like chewing a fish-​flavored sponge. I’ll take the check please. I usually have a strong stomach, but as I write this review, I can feel the nausea coming on. I can’t wait to blast this experience out of the other end.

Food is amazing!!! Very tasty!!!
Cockroaches on the floor… not so amazing! Very surprising because the restaurant appears to be very clean.

We love the sushi here! Connie is always so sweet and the food is so tasty + very reasonably priced. Yamato has quickly become our favorite sushi spot.

Okay restaurant. The tea is made from tea bag, and it tastes funny. We had california roll and yakisoba.

I absolutely LOVE Yamato. Compared to other Japanese restaurants, I feel that Yamato is fairly priced. Although the workers don’t speak the best English, they still greatly appreciate ALL of their business and they even go above and beyond to make sure that their customers are satisfied. I remember one day that I took my little sister and brother to eat there and they both had accidentally spilled their drinks. She happily moved us and didn’t make us feel at all bad and even gave the kids a really cute toy with M&Ms. If I could eat there every day I would. Their food is SO yummy!

Awesome service and great food! Loved the spider roll.
Highly recommend stopping in.

I think this place has been through a couple of ownership changes but the food has stayed consistent. I’ve only been here for lunch and the bento boxes are a great deal! The food is delicious and filling without being ultra heavy. The sushi is awsome as well. The
, caterpillar, and valentine rolls are crazy good. The service is also speedy and welcoming. The atmosphere feels warm and homey. The waitresses are always super friendly and in a good mood and refill your fountain drink promptly. You can’t go wrong here.

Our favorite restaurant downtown! Always excellent service. So friendly. Food is great and very good prices. Not crowded and very relaxing for my family to enjoy dinner. We love it!

So the atmosphere here isn’t that great. It’s very quiet and just blah. Maybe have some music playing or something? The service wasn’t that great, the girl working seemed more interested in being on her phone and sitting behind the counter. The sushi was great though, presented well and delicious. Prices are great too, 3 rolls and 1 appetizer for $ 33.

Service was nice.
Chinese owned, went in around 7:30 pm.
Kids were behind the counter it was cute but a little unprofessional, but it’s understandable and didn’t bother me really.
Décor was alright but missing, no music. It was kinda dead inside too.
I ordered a philly role that came out to 6.25, got it to go. The to go box was cute but kind of reminded me of the kind of sushi you can purchase at a Safeway or a gas station.
The taste was a bit better but about what you would expect, very mediocre. Cream cheese was the most prominent flavor in this dish, not salmon. :/​so eh.
Didn’t really get that raw salmon fix~
Service — Good
Food — Eh
Ambiance — Eh

I freakin’ love yamamto. I am a pretty picky eater and have the pallet of a child so I stick with the beef and chicken teriyaki bento box. It has some salad with dressing I never heard of (which is delicious) a side of rice, cucumbers, and the beef and chicken.
Not only that, but the lady who is usually in the store is amazing at service. Right when I even thought I needed a refill of soda, she was there to ask if I needed a refill of soda and got it for me.
Great place, great service.

Very nice Oyakodon. I also ordered gyoza that were cooked to perfection. I’ll be sure to return again… They also have Yakisoba!

This place is pretty okay. The service is alright, today we only had one server who was super nice and sweet but it was pretty slow and it was hard for us to communicate with the slight language barrier. The place was empty except for our party of 7. The veggie udon was on the sweeter side, which was odd to me. The sushi was small and not super fresh. The rice was good though, not too sticky and not too tough.

My tonkatsu here was very good, however the wait after being seated was extremely long, and it was close to 2 hours before we received our food. The staff in total was only 3 people, and they seemed overwhelmed by the number of people ordering. I would advise to order ahead of time for takeout.

In terms of food, this place is pretty good. The only problems I’ve had are :
— the price I’d too high for the quality of the food
— the service is not good enough for the price you pay.
If you only care about the food and not the rest of the dining experience, than I would try this place.

Very tasty! The service was quick. The restaurant was extremely clean. The food was fresh, delicious, and well plated. I really enjoyed it! I had the California Rolls and miso soup. I really liked the soup, I could’ve eaten 2 servings!

As I traversed Livermore yesterday in search of my Manpuku replacement (since they have gone skimpy on how much seafood they put into their seafood udon soup) I came across Yamato. 1:30 in the afternoon on a Friday. After walking past the bustling Ale House to get there I have to ask myself how Yamato pays the rent in this expensive part of town. Every time I have gone past the place is empty. This was actually my second visit and the experience was consistent with my first visit. I would like to see the place succeed and be another viable Japanese fare option in Livermore but they are going to have to make some changes if they want to bring people in.
First and foremost, they need to address the freshness of the seafood. I know it must be difficult to keep the freshest on hand when there aren’t a lot of customers coming through the door. Maybe that problem contains its own solution? The temptation to use yesterday’s or from the day before must be strong. Keep it fresh anyway. The unagi on the unagi nigiri you served us was not fresh. I mean it was noticeably not fresh. I love unagi and normally there would never, ever, be leftovers with me in the room, however the two pieces we brought home went into the dog’s bowl.
My seafood udon soup had plenty of seafood but the broth does not compare to Manpuku’s. Manpuku’s is much better, so I would tweak that recipe – and while you are at it, get rid of the chlorine taste in the water (both in the broth and in the drinking water). In fact, most everything we tasted had a hint of «cleanser» flavor to it, including the teriyaki sauce in my friend’s chicken bento. I mean, clean is good and all. I just don’t want to taste it. BTW – the tempura in that bento was overcooked.
Finally the ambiance. Guys – improve the food quality like I said above and change the place so it doesn’t like a Subway sandwich store with a picture of Fuji thrown in and your establishment could be rockin’. Seriously – if you don’t know what to do, hire a decorator. The place is stark – almost clinical in appearance and ambiance. Do these things and you guys could have a line out the door. You are in a great location. Do something with it!

I brought my mom here last week after checking out some of their Unilocal reviews.
We were actually really surprised when we came in because the place looks like a fast food Chinese restaurant. We were starving so we sat down and began browsing their menu. I mean seriously, their prices are so cheap! Some rolls were like $ 6.95?! We couldn’t believe their prices because they are smacked in the middle of downtown. They’re cheaper than supermarket sushi!
We both started with some miso, which was amazing during the rainy weather. It was actually very tasty. My mom ordered the spicy salmon roll and I had the spicy crunchy roll. We both enjoyed our food. Although, they did not lie when they said «spicy» because my mouth was on fire after eating half of my roll.
What stood out the most though is the petite Asian lady who was working there. She was so sweet and friendly! She genuinely looked so happy to be working there (maybe she’s the owner?) She was so attentive throughout our meal.
I wouldn’t recommend Yamato for a date night, but it’s definitely a great deal for some casual meal with some family and friends.

I feel bad writing this review. The family that owns this place doesn’t seem too happy. there is a kid who was there that was being yelled at by the chef. I assume it’s his dad?
pretty uncomfortable. What made it worse is that we were the only people in there.
The sushi was decent for the price. Hibachi was tasteless.
to top it off there was a bug in our edamame. check our pics to see for yourself.