I am in love. My adoration of sushi keeps growing and I just love how many different adventures you can have in one meal with sushi. Like I tell all my friends who make«the face» when you mention sushi thinking its raw fish. Many people unknowingly use the terms«Sushi» and«Sashimi» interchangeably, while they are actually two totally distinct and separate items. You have cooked and non cooked fish depending on what you are ordering. This location is fantastic for up to the bar Sushi. I love their Iowa roll. We stopped by and it happened to be on sale! Yum! I always seem to over eat when it comes to Sushi. Its so easy to do cause you want to try them all. My friend and I went right up to the bar and enjoyed watching the preparation of all the sushi as we chatted. I also had a bowl of soup. We split three separate rolls, which is the way to «roll» when you go for sushi and want to try it all. I will be back again and again.
Karrissa A.
Évaluation du lieu : 2 West Des Moines, IA
Last nights experience at Samurai was unfortunately a let down, which is too bad because we normally have a great time. We normally go for sushi, but last night we were in the mood for some Udon. Since Samurai is right down the street from us, we chose to stop here as they had udon soup. My boyfriend and I both ordered the Nabeyaki Udon. While we were waiting, we got the salads with ginger dressing which was nice to have since we were starving. Right after our udon was served a feud broke out between the servers who were all gathered near the bar and multiple expletives and f-bombs were dropped for all to hear… a full dining area is probably not the best place to be arguing. We continued to eat out udon, trying not to pay attention to the disruption around us, but unfortunately the Nabeyaki udon was not too enjoyable either. The broth was very very bland, the egg was way overdone, there was supposed to be fish cake in the udon, but there wasn’t, and probably the worst part about it was the chicken pieces were extremely dry and tasted like they were old frozen chicken breasts… not good. Our server never checked on us the entire meal(he was involved in the server dispute), and in order to get our check another server noticed we were just sitting there waiting and he came over to get it for us. I’m giving this an extra star because the sushi is good, but I don’t think I wish be back any time soon.
Meredith C.
Évaluation du lieu : 5 Avon, CT
We love this place. Fabulous fresh sashimi and sushi, amazing seafood soup, nice atmosphere and very pleasant staff!
Sally H.
Évaluation du lieu : 1 Urbandale, IA
Horrible service, bland food and boring presentation. Soups came at the same time at the chef. Asked for a bottle of wine and 15 mins later got a glass, not a bottle. Nothing compared to Taki or Ohana
Theresa C.
Évaluation du lieu : 2 Des Moines, IA
If I were basing this on the food alone, this review would be 3.5 stars. The service we had was so strange though, I don’t think we’ll be back. The low points: 1. Being told by the server that she thinks warm saki is gross after I ordered it(I think she thought I was looking for advice). Still, who uses the word gross to describe anything on their own menu. 2. The other half of the hibachi station where we were sitting was not cleared off for the first 30 minutes of our visit and it was never wiped down. The cart of dirty dishes was parked nearby the entire time. This was not due to a lack of staff and they weren’t busy.
Bill L.
Évaluation du lieu : 4 Ankeny, IA
Samurai Sushi is a very nice sushi restaurant with great décor and atmosphere. We visited here many months ago and had a good time. The waitress we had was very friendly, but I believe she was new as there were many things she was unsure of, but she was very nice. We ordered the Green Dragon Roll and the Rainbow Naruto Roll. The Green Dragon Roll was a very good cooked sushi roll, we usually like to get a cooked and raw roll to have a different taste in our mouth. The Rainbow Naruto Roll is very unique, excellently presented, and tastes great*!(*The cucumber it is wrapped in is too thick and too overpowering. I had to remove a majority of the cucumber from each roll which made the taste of fish actually reveal itself.) I ordered the O-toro, but they came back a few minutes later and stated they did not have it.(which every restaurant is ALWAYS out of this VERY seasonal/rare dish) Overall a good experience.
Joy B.
Évaluation du lieu : 5 West Des Moines, IA
The staff here is always so friendly. I have brought my 5 year old with me every time I’ve been here and they are always so good with him. On the hibachi side and the restaurant side, they are nice. They have lots of specials, some nights of the week they have specials on the specialty rolls, I think they are like $ 5 when they normally range from $ 7 – 12, so that’s a great deal. A different night of the week all the specialty cocktails are $ 5, hello my new best friends! lol But really, great food, fast service, nice staff, and good drinks. Highly recommended.
Emily T.
Évaluation du lieu : 3 Newton, IA
I have been here a handful of times. The first visit by far was the best experience. We were a group of couples and our chef was very entertaining and generous. We all had a fabulous time. Unfortunately, we have not experienced this service on our subsequent visits. The more recent visits have been ok. The food is fine, but the experience is lacking and for me, that is a good part of the hibachi dining experience. The service has also been ok. I often wonder when restaurants charge an automatic tip percent on a group of large people, that the servers don’t feel they need to give adequate service. Last night we waited forever for our checks and honestly, we probably could have walked and not paid and they would not have known until the end of the night. In general, the hibachi grill is great for all ages. Adults come for saki bombs, girls night and kids enjoy watching their food cooked right in front of them with utensils flying through the air. For the money, you may want to look around and see what the competition offers.
Dorothy H.
Évaluation du lieu : 3 Adair, IA
Hibachi was awful! Very bland meat. Giant plate with very little food. I had scallop and shrimp combo. No flavor rubbery. We ordered a ufc roll now that was wonderful! So 3 stars do not order habachi but roll with the sushi!
Dmitriy N.
Évaluation du lieu : 3 Waukee, IA
This place is ok. Its worth coming on Wednesdays when they have 3 specialty rolls for $ 20. Their sushi rolls come in large portions and are flavorful with plenty of sauce and crunchy stuff. All kinds of bells and whistles on the sushi to make it very tasty for someone that fears the beautiful simplicity of fresh clean raw fish. The rolls taste good but are the size of a burrito. So much rice and all kinds of other stuff that the seafood and some of the other vegetables in the roll get lost. I have tried the hibachi and fried rice and a couple of other items that taste alright. But nothing at this place jumps out at me. I would recommend this place to a person that fears raw fish when ordering sushi. But if you are someone that wants fresh tasting fish at its simplest form, then you may want to try a different place.
Sumita B.
Évaluation du lieu : 4 Urbandale, IA
Ordered two spicy tuna handrolls and two spicy scallops handrolls to go. Picked up ordered and got home they gave us the sushi rolls cut up. We specifically asked over the phone before hanging up the phone if they wrote down handrolls. They said they did. We called back and told them about our situation and they gave us a credit for our next order. Overall the rolls were decent tasting. I would order again and try other rolls. This is one of the few places open late on a Sunday.
Jessica A.
Évaluation du lieu : 1 Des Moines, IA
Bottom line why I’ll never go back nor recommended this place. Why? 1. Sloppy servers 2. Sloppy service 3. Very poor seafood quality 4. Inconsistent décor I definitely enjoy my sushi and know it very well. I always go in with an open mind but the service was off putting & never got better. Our server was unprofessional(literally said if we wanted to start off with any«shit») and had no clue to the beer selection when asked for suggestions. He was forgetful and seemed very distracted. I also am a server so I look at other variables that could have taken place. Nope… He’s just a bad server PLUS stated he’s been there for 3yrs so I had higher expectations. The remaining servers looked unkept(shirts untucked, smacking their gum, poor communication/grammer with customers, etc) and the hostess looked unprofessional with her bedazzled jeans. The seafood was a joke. Just as good of «quality» as Hyvee which means 2 thumbs down. The egg looked like what food looks like in an ad(fake & painted), the rolls were not tight & more rice than ingredients.
Jean M.
Évaluation du lieu : 5 Denver, CO
Great ambience, amazing sushi and loved the bartender Brian he was very friendly! I will be back every tues if I can!
Kathe S.
Évaluation du lieu : 4 Grimes, IA
I am writing this review for my husband as he was just introduced to Sushi a few years ago but he and his buddies have become Wednesday night Sushi addicts at Samurai! Samurai has a special every Wednesday where you can get 2 – 3 special rolls for $ 20. And when they say special rolls they don’t mean a small california roll — they mean huge sushi rolls! This group of guys get together and will go and eat more sushi then I thought was humanly possible — and they do it almost every Wednesday — but they only go to Samurai. The favorite of all of theirs is the UFC roll which actually has steak on it along with with the seafood. The service is always very good — you have to plan to be there for a few hours though a lot of times because Wednesday’s are busy and they hand roll each roll to order and when there is a group of 4 – 6 of them it takes awhile. I don’t care for seafood so if I go I get the fried rice or chicken teppanyaki meal .it’s pretty good however I like TAKI’s teppanyaki and fried rice better than Samurai and WAY better than Ohanas. SO if you want amazing sushi go to Samurai on Wednesdays. They also have martini specials.
Keith H.
Évaluation du lieu : 2 West Des Moines, IA
Went for the second time to this restaurant and both times were really pretty bad. The salad that came with my meal was served with brown lettuce, I can cope with lettuce that’s wilted and maybe has a bit of brown on the edges but the lettuce that we were served was days past the point a restaurant that respected its customers would serve. The dish I had was some chicken hibatchi dish which was boring but not offensive tasting. The curious thing though was even though I got a dish with no shrimp in it, there were still three shrimp that was in it when I got it. I like shrimp, but the fact that that much got into a dish that wasn’t supposed to contain it says that this restaurant isn’t actually putting effort into keeping their proteins separate and certainly if I kept kosher or had other dietary restraints I would be avoiding this place. My wife had sushi and though she’s too nice to complain about it she did also walk away disappointed in her sushi dish as well. Any restaurant can have a rough night but both the times we have dined with this place have left us regretting the decision to come out. I would expect that I’ve been here for the last time.
Doug C.
Évaluation du lieu : 1 West Des Moines, IA
How is this place still in business? Our group has gone here probably 6 times over the last 3 years and it just gets worse and worse. The woman hostess/owner(?) could absolutely care less about any type of customer service. Not only did we really wait 20+ minutes to even be spoken to at the hostess stand, once we got our name in, we could never actually get an idea of how long our wait would be. We finally got seated and were the last table in the teppanyaki room. The reason we weren’t seated before we were? Because they don’t believe in cleaning tables. Once a party is done, the dirty dishes just stay until the end of the evening! So we get that last table… order…and wait… and wait. A chef comes over, checks the temperature of the grill, and walks away. When he comes back 10 minutes later? The grill still isn’t hot, and he tells us HEWILLBEBACKINANOTHER15MINUTES! What? No no no no no. So I complain to the owner(?) and her solution? Can’t move to another table because they are all dirty. Apologize? Oh no. They make the chef come back, and begin to cook our food on a less than sufficiently hot teppanyaki grill. At this point, we should have walked, but crime in Italy, we had put up with so much over the prior 90+ minutes we decided to stick it out… After our lukewarm fried rice and overpriced rest of our meal, I really expected at least an apology or maybe a discount… no. Not a word, but our check. Seriously. DONOTGOHERE! Avoid the aggravation and go to Taki or Ohana. Skip this dump.
Neil B.
Évaluation du lieu : 3 West Des Moines, IA
While the Sushi is one of my favorites, the service experience makes me reduce my stars for this restaurant. Let’s focus on the positive: The ingredients always seem fresh, and the specialty rolls are excellent considering how land-locked Iowa is. The chefs are skilled and always have beautiful plating. Going there occasionally on their special nights is one of my favorites – you can gorge yourself in specialty rolls and get your full money’s worth. I have never had good customer service there though. It’s sad. Besides doing the specialty night once in a while, my wife and I always do take-out here. It’s a happy compromise – delicious food, poor service, so we would rather just stick with the delicious food and avoid the poor experience :-)
Andrea S.
Évaluation du lieu : 4 New Albany, OH
Not too shabby of a place. There are def a few other places in DSM that I would say has better sushi rolls overall, but it’s still pretty good. The hibachi is pretty tasty too — service can be slower at times & may be a little frustrating, but the food from the hibachi grill will be worth the wait! Not a lot of tricks from the hibachi chef like some other places, but hey, at the end of the day, I’m there to eat not watch a show so not too big of a concern for me.
D B.
Évaluation du lieu : 5 Urbandale, IA
Great spot for lunch. The service is very good, and the sushi is great! I’ve been the occasional customer for 8 years — never had a bad bite or experience. Best spot in wdm imo.
Emily S.
Évaluation du lieu : 1 West Des Moines, IA
Sooo this place has REALLY gone down hill. Used to go here a lot because it’s close to where I live and pretty decent sushi. I went last night and the front desk lady literally didn’t even acknowledge my boyfriend and I for ten minutes — granted they were busy. But no «I’ll be right with you» or anything! We almost walked out. This should’ve been an indicator of how the rest of the service went. NOTGOOD! — crackhead waiter. I think the people that sat next to us dined and ditched because they sat waiting for their ticket for so long. If you get food from here — carry out. for God’s sake! someone could not pay me to dine in here one more time. And the sushi is … Decent it is not OMG phenomenal.