Thousand Cranes and Garden Grill

05/24/09

expensive, boring

by Lichtsprecher at Citysearch

So the teppanyaki was rather bland. While the food was of top quality, the chefs were listless and didn't provide any sort of show. When I go to teppanyaki, I expect a show from the chefs. These chefs don't introduce themselves, they don't talk to you, they just cook, the food for you. No pyrotechnics, no percussion using cooking utensils, no flipping food into your mouth. Boring and lame. On top of that, they charge ridiculous prices for small amounts of food. I would not return and recommend that no one else go.

• Pros: Top quality food
• Cons: Expensive, and lackluster

07/01/08

Great Atmosphere with overpriced food

by sink at Citysearch

Compared with similar restaurants in Tokyo, Thousand Cranes is cheaper. However, with average set dinners at $85, I would expect better for the price in Los Angeles. As recommended by others in their reviews here and elsewhere, half of our party went with the premium sushi/sashimi dinner ($85) and half went with the Kaiseki dinner ($85). The premium sushi/sashimi dinner started with couple of raw oysters (yum), a plate of pickled veggie, 8 pieces of sashimi, 6 piece sushi plate, and small tempura plate (two shrimps and sweet potato). The sashimi was good, sushi was only decent. The toro was too grainy and did not melt in the mouth. The Kaiseki dinner was better in my opinion in terms of presentation and taste. The drawback was lack of description for each course. In Japan, the restaurant typically furnishes the diners with a description of each course.

We had good service since I did approach the host and told him about the recent reviews about poor service. He informed me that he had seen it as well and the restaurant is addressing the problem by hiring and training experienced servers. We did enjoy our meal in tatami room; it was a delight to spend time with our closest friends.

• Pros: Ambience
• Cons: Price and food taste

03/01/08

Change of ownership = Downhill quality and service

by TopCuisine at Citysearch

I used to go here quite often for their Sunday Brunch. Ownership and Management changed recently around 2008. Geisha wearing, polite and attentive servers are now gone. Oysters are half their former size. They run out of food often and are slow to bring new dishes. You have to ask 2 or more times to get your drinks refilled. It no longer represents a traditional japanese restaurant, but rather only looks like one. They promised to take corrective action when I brought these issues to them. Two weeks later nothing had changed. I no longer go there, where as I used two at once or twice each month.