Nakama Japanese Steakhouse - Pittsburgh

[tharrison]

Warning: This will probably end up being pretty ranty... so read on with caution

So tonight me and my husband decide to try the new Nakama Japanese Steakhouse on the South Side (which bills it self as Hibachi/sushi but isn't the steel plate grill a teppan grill?). We hit the place around 5:30pm or so thinking we'd try and beat the Friday night rush. We get seated immediately with another party of 6. We then wait... and wait.... and wait... and wait while a boatload of servers are just standing around right next to our table gabbing. No one even bothers to look and see we haven't even gotten a drink order taken until one of us flags down a waiter and politely let's them know no one has attended to us. He does The Right Thing and apologizes and takes our drink orders. I've never been a server, but I always thought that when everyone does their jobs, it's no big deal to pick up the slack for another because everything balances out in the end, right? You're in the weeds, I do a favor for you... vice versa... saves face, the customer is satisfied... tips are good. Maybe I'm an Idealist, who knows

This doesn't bother me so much, sure the place is new. Has some snags. But no one has taught these servers to grow a spine. I'm probably more forgiving than I should be when it comes to mediocre service, too (servers have bad days, just like the rest of us and I know I sure as hell I couldn't survive even one day in their shoes and I really respect the ones that do their jobs well). Finally we get a waitress to come to us. She kinda apologizes but it's more like an excuse that they screwed up the servers schedules and the person assigned to our table isn't in or something. Yadda yadda yadda. Whatever. I'm just happy we got someone's attention. She takes our orders. btw, I think the only reason we didn't bother walking out at this point was because we didn't want to screw the other 6 people we didn't know since we figured they'd try to find a party of 2 to take our place before they'd send anyone to take our order and it would take even longer).

Seeing how this is all going, I'm trying not to be a P.I.T.A. but I'm really craving some tuna so I ask if I can substitute a piece of tuna for the scallops in the "Land and Sea" combo meal (if only because if purchased separately the scallops and tuna have identical prices). I'm fully prepared to order my second choice if this isn't possible, but I figure if I don't ask I'll never know. She is confused, says no at first giving us the reason that they're not the same cost so I can't substitute (if that was the case, I'd understand -- I'm not one to ask if I can substitute the fries with a side of filet mignon and expect them to say yes hehe), my husband points out on the other menu tuna is the same price as the scallops, she hems and haws, says she'll have to go ask, permission granted. Yay! Things seem to be going much better. I also place an order for some hamachi nigiri to check out their fish quality. It's only ok, I don't really expect much from Pittsburgh in terms of seafood (I grew up eating fish I caught, so I'm extremely picky about my fish. My irrational way about thinking of seafood: If I can afford it, I probably don't want to eat it ).

Cook guy comes out, cooks our meal, ok food (I figure most people come to these places for the show more than the food anyhow). The only problem being that I order my tuna rare and the guy next to me orders his medium. He gives the other guy my kinda rare tuna (as in he was paying more attention to the lobster the guy ordered than the tuna) and me the well done tuna. This I don't really care about because the tuna is not very fresh anyways (This coming from the person that can taste the chlorine in the crusts from the tap water the local pizza joints use, so maybe the tuna is good for Pittsburgh standards, but I can taste a quite pronounced "fishy" quality). Oh, well. The steak is pretty decent for the tuna being terrible, so I'm satisfied for the time being.

The waitress comes with the check.. but it's only one check and she knew we were two separate parties. She disappears. If we had cash on us, we wouldn't have minded. We have to flag her down. With our combos, we were all supposed to get our choice of ice cream or sorbet. We have to remind her of this as we're asking for separate checks, mostly so the other party's kids can eat it since kids love dessert. She doesn't ask us our choice and just brings out ice cream. Whatever. The ice cream is a moot point -- it's more the principle of the matter. Teppanyaki places aren't inexpensive either (granted, I've had much more expensive meals but if I wanted crappy service I wouldn't bother paying $30+ a plate for it).

So, I tell my husband maybe we should flag down the floor manager to let him know how our dinner went as constructive criticism. If you don't tell them how do they know? We waited until he came back to the podium and let him know that we waited around 30 minutes and had to request someone take our drink order and basically that we felt we didn't have the best possible experience. He blew us off. I was pretty much over the fact the service wasn't up to par but the manager absolutely and completely blowing us off and treating us like dirt is what really ticked me off. He didn't even apologize. He just shrugged and walked away.

By the time we left, this place was packed. If anyone else has gone to this place, I'd really like to know what your experiences were. If the manager had maybe been even a tad sympathetic, I think we would have entertained the thought of giving them a second chance once they were more established seeing as they're only about 2 weeks old. Now I think not. This is the first time in a few years that I've had to give the bare minimum (15%) as a tip (which usually averages >30% for us).

Maybe he figured since the place was packed he didn't have to apoligize -- more customers would still come. But as soon as people realize this is how they treat you and the "it" place vibe wears off... they might be hurting. Sad because from what I read they spent a load of money building this joint. Too bad the owners didn't screen their staff a little better. I really, really, really hope that our experience was the exception and not the rule for their sake. Pittsburgh needs more good places to grab a bite.

The only 2 things that I recommend about Nakama: the "steak sauce" (I use that term loosely because if your steak is bad enough for me to have to use a sauce.... hehe) is pretty good (tastes of beer, garlic, ginger, maybe some teriyaki?) and the bathrooms have really cool tiling and these automagical paper towel dispenser things that are pretty nifty. Too bad that alone is not worth the cost of "admission."

Oh yeah, they must have thought I was about 12 years old because a few different servers came along with toys for the 2 young children at our table and also brought one for me (too bad they didn't bother getting us drinks). This I'm used to and find it amusing (along with being asked if I'm old enough to sit in an exit row and being brought pilot's wings on airplane trips). Also, the guy at the next table that almost got hara-kiri'ed when the server flung his knife doing a trick along with the lady that was examining the wad of wasabi, obviously not knowing what it was, wondering if she should just pop it in her mouth and deciding at the last minute not to (phew! for her sake) were particularly amusing.

[mandrake]

I was particularly irritated that we were blown off when we were pointing out some serious deficits in their service. You would think that the guy in charge of the front would be a little less stand-offish or at least a little nicer to me, regardless of the fact that neither of us was dressed head to toe in versace like half the people currently in their restaurant (it was friday night on South Side - when this part of town turns to party central).

I also like how their wait staff isn't empowered to make any decisions worth a damn. You'd think since the place is entirely run cook-to-order that replacing one item of a given price with another of the same exact price would be a no-brainer. Instead it took her an additional 5 minutes to figure it out. Not to mention she thought that they were, in fact, not the same price (though any schmuck could look at the menu section where each of them were labelled as 19 and tell you that they were, in fact, exactly the same price).

Mandrake

[Jason Perlow]

Hey Geoff and Tammy! welcome to eGullet, finally

[tharrison]

Hi Jason *waves* I've been lurking around here since May or so. I love reading eGullet

When Rachel suggested I post stuff about Pgh eats, this place stirred up enough frustration I figured I'd take a stab at it (I still laugh when I think about the guy that almost got gutted by the flying knife).

[Chris Cognac]

Well I guess if they keep it up they wont be around long enough to matter anyways! I love those places too...I have pretty much always had great food and service at Benihana's...but I guess "this ain't no Benihana"

[beckygpa]

I just wanted to respond to tharrison and those thereafter. My name is Becky Gomes and I am co-owner of Nakama Japanese Steakhouse and Sushi Bar. I appreciate your feedback from your visit and am here to assure you that we are aware that things were a bit hairy---especially the first month!!! We were uncertain of our opening date as the City of Pgh laid off lots of workers so when we finally got approval to open, we had Grand Openings and were a bit unprepared for the overflow of people we had the first two weekends. I forwarded your message on to both of our managers and we are addressing the issues of service with our servers. I ask you for your patience. We want to be a place were all guests can come and have perfect service, and a great meal, as well as a good time. We feel we are getting there but not without working lots of kinks out on the way. So, I apologize if you had a bad meal. And I certainly am addressing the 'blowing off' of by the manager. That is unacceptable. I hope you are good enough to give us another chance. If you will visit our website at www.eatatnakama.com and click "Get a Free Appetizer" you will be provided a coupon to get a free appetizer as long as you leave your email address. Our goal is to make our guests happy and very satisfied with the food and service. I know we will get there. I hope you will revisit and accept my apologies. Thanks for your time and for your feedback.

Warmly,

Becky Gomes