Chinamoto

Christina G invited Nina S and me to go with her to use up a groupon. (Are you seeing a pattern here? We are coupon queens.) The deal was for $ 80 for four or more people. Having our forth person cancel last minute, I called the restaurant, and the manager was willing to let us use it for $ 60. Worked in their favor anyway.
The atmosphere is kind of clubby, and they had probably half the tables inside than could fit. My guess is to make it look more crowded.
We ordered a round of drinks, which took 25 minutes to come. Our server took them off the bill, on her own accord. I did like my drink once I had it.
Nina and Chris both got Tom Yum soup, which was ok and better than my salad. The iceberg lettuce hadn’t been dried after washing, so I was left with a puddle at the bottom of my bowl.
We shared various rolls, and the sushi was decent. We all agreed spicy scallop was the best.
Nina and I ordered a second round of drinks, which took probably 10 minutes, and came out incorrectly.
At the end of the meal I gave my credit card and made a trip to the bathroom. I came back to find out the card machine was down and we could wait/​see if we had enough cash/​or go to the ATM.
I felt badly for our server and I made it clear that while I was not annoyed with her, I was really annoyed.
I won’t go back.

I came here for happy hour with friends. I really dig the décor and presentation. As far as food wise, it was ok. Nothing too extraordinary. I have to try other food to fully review on it. Overall, the service was good and I would come back.

Went for the first time using the Groupon and would definitely return with one somewhat major caveat. We sat at the bar to watch the world series which was nice. Good use of the projector. Ordered a mix of sashimi and rolls. All were fresh, presented well and not overdone with rice. Four the gluten free crowd they have gluten free soy sauce and their tempura dishes are wheat free as well. Didn’t know that going into it, but I never ordered fried food when I could eat it. Nice plus though. The wait staff was friendly and helpful. The sushi came quick.
My biggest beef is the bar stools were made for giants. I’m 5’10″ and felt like a little kid in need of a booster seat. Felt bad for my buddy who was a few inches shorter. Thought about going there to watch Eagles away games, but I won’t return unless the replace the stools. Would go with friends if we were getting a table, but not to sit at the bar to enjoy a game, which is a shame because I would go there tomorrow for the Eagles/​Packers. This is the only reason I don’t give it more stars, because it’s a reason preventing me from returning for one reason or another.

I recently met my friend for dinner at Chinamoto. She had a Groupon she needed to use before it expired and had been there in the past for happy hour.
The restaurant offers free valet parking which I was planning on using until I easily found a street spot around the side of the 777 building. My friend was already seated in a half table/​half booth towards the back. I was facing the inside so I didn’t really get to take in much of the atmosphere. I did get to take in their «mood lighting». There was an overhead light a few tables down that would turn on and off every 10 minutes or so. At first I thought they were dimming the lights but then the light would come back on and then go off again. Pretty annoying.
Our server was friendly and nice. However when I asked her about the draft list she was uncertain. You would think it was a huge, ever changing list however it turned out just to be Miller Light and one kind of Yards. I went with the a vodka based cocktail that had various pomegranate flavoring. I don’t recall the name and their website doesn’t have a functioning menu so I can’t tell you for sure. The drink came out in a martini glass and included a little green thing floating in the bottom that kind of looked like piece of oregano. I didn’t feel like being a pain so I drank around it. As far as I know, it wasn’t supposed to be there and didn’t add any flavor.
I went with the maki combo for dinner, which included soup or salad. I went with the salad, which was okay. It consisted of iceberg lettuce, cucumber, one cherry tomato and a pretty weak ginger dressing. I believe the maki combo included one California roll, one tuna roll and one other roll (maybe salmon?). It wasn’t bad but it definitely wasn’t memorable.
I’m glad I went because I was with good company, but I would not go back for dinner. I heard the happy hour is super cheap, so maybe I’d give that a try. Chinamoto «specializes» in Chinese, Japanese and Thai food so perhaps Japanese just isn’t their specialty.

The drinks are fantastic and the rolls are incredible! Great service from the bartender too.

Happy Hour Review~
How can I put this simply… AWESOME.
May it be a dinner date or happy hour, it’s great for both.
My boyfriend and I had a full dinner and drinks during happy hour and our total came to $ 48 pretip. We ordered pork gyoza, edamame, and 5 different sushi rolls (6 pieces each), and 4 drinks total (2 rounds each). For a full dinner where we got appetizers, entrée and 2 drinks each $ 48 is pretty gosh darn good when it comes to a sushi dinner.
DRINKS: I was a huge fan of the tokyo tea. Not to call myself an alcoholic. but I can drink. And two of these, got me pretty gone… he had to drive home. And I passed out when I got home haha. Tasted great too. My bf got the Samurai (which comes in a girly martini glass), I got a kick outta that one. But he really loved the smooth taste of sake+vodka together.
FOOD: Great for the price. I compare the quality similar to Vics. So don’t expect beautiful rolls like Fat Salmon. but it tasted fresh, was great — just like Vics :)
SERVICE: was off to a baddd start at first. Took a solid 5 minutes for them to take my order and come back with my drinks. 5 minutes is pretty long when you’re the only 2 people in the restaurant. After that though, they picked it up. This is the sole reason they are not a 5 star yet… :)
ALSO. Their drinks have awesome animé names. +½ star ;)

The sushi was pretty good but the service not so much. Green tea was served lukewarm not once but twice. The ambience would have been nice except the played red hot chili peppers. The. Whole. Time. Not sure how that’s supposed to appeal to a mixed dinner crowd on a Saturday evening??? We had no issue using our living social coupon and overall the food was good but considering how many other great sushi restaurants there are in the city we will not be going back.

we were lucky to purchase a voucher for a discount to Chinamoto. Even with the discount, we were disappointed.
The atmosphere is a problem. The bathrooms are like the bat cave — dark and dingy. The toilet seats are bent and tilted, showing a lack of maintenance or cheap quality products. The women’s room had a wooden board holding the main doorway opened all evening, not sure why, and I almost broke my foot on it upon exit. We were seated at a front table that is more like a hot tub configuration with a large table in the middle of it. All four of us are athletic but found it difficult to enter and exit our seats; had we been wearing dresses and heels, it would not have been possible. The food was mediocre. The salad had more dressing than lettuce; the sushi combo plate was not pleasing; the basil beef dish was spicy though not advertised as such; the rice was hard and pebble-​like; the soda was flat and no bubbly soda could be found; they offer one flavor of tea only.
Now for the good part: We are eager to have good restaurants in this part of town. Chinamoto has a great location, parking is all around and it offers valet. The service by Hailey (sorry if misspelled) was exceptional. So you have what it takes to get a good restaurant working. Keep working on it — we need you in this part of the city!

This place is interesting… I think it may be going for something more upscale and loungy than it actually is. Well we had a groupon so figured we’d try it. The place is very open and modern looking, with kind of distracting asian type music playing, reminding us of karaōke bars. So first we tried the spring rolls, which were super greasy, but OK. Then the standard salad with ginger dressing, also average. My coconut salmon was AWESOME, highly recommend. The sauce was deliciously sweet and flavorful, and they were nice to sub the rice for steamed veggies. My vegetarian husband got the udon noodles, but it didn’t mention there was beef in it as usually this does not come with beef in other places. We told the waiter and he didn’t seem too happy, but was able to get him a new plate in a couple of minutes with no meat and just veggies. So not sure why the first order took about 30 min to get out. Also, that entrée is under the section that states they all come with rice, but since it’s a noodle dish it doesn’t…they may want to update that in the menu. In the end, the bill was around $ 40 plus a random $ 3 fee for ‘open food’ never heard of that before but whatever, didn’t feel like asking about it. So overall, this place is OK but does not have a comfortable or warm feeling.

The first thing I noticed upon arrival was the beautiful décor. We were greeted right away and the server was very knowledgeable. I ordered the general Tso chicken which was recommended by our server. It was wonderful crispy on the outside nice chunks of flavorful white meat on the inside. Needless to say it put my usual favorite (PF CHANGS) to shame. I will definitely be back !

‘Sushi for two’ that comes only with ONE soup OR ONE salad ??? So one person has to have the soup and the other has to have the salad? what if both want the soup or both want the salad??? what the hell is that dumb rule???
Food was good but not exceptional service was just ok (we had to ask for the soy sauce after the sushi was served…).
no ambiance… Place was near to empty on a Saturday night — the place next door tashan seemed a lot more fun… everyone was there, no-​one was here.
Also only choice of a BAD, cheap house sake for a place that serves a lot of sushi is lame…
This place would have potential to be nice and fun but this was a total miss, and I will not go back…

Cocktails, below average. I can make better ones at home.
Spring rolls, the worst ones I have had in life.
Lamb chops smallest ones ever, over done and chewy.
Mango chicken, not better than a cheap Chinese takeout.
Sizzling duck, you would be expecting a sizzler, but no. What you get is a luke warm dish with a pre-​cooked duck warmed up in microwave and presented to you. You can get a better one at Chinese takeout. In retrospect a completely empty restaurant should have been our clue about the food.

I’ve eaten here about 50 times since my last review (ok, so I exaggerate a little). I’ve had lots of sushi, their cold plate appetizers, salads and fried rice. I love this place. Simple. Understated. Delicious food. Look, its not high end dining. The service is quirky but food is worth it.

I schedule a reservation for 7. We showed a little late with no issues from the staff. They sat us where we wanted and were very attentive to our experience. The staff was very knowledgable concerning drink and food specials. Though, we didn’t drink. The 3 tuna seviche was very good, well plated, and fresh.
We took advantage of the Living Social deal, so we order 2 rolls of each Spicy Salmon, Tuna and Yellowfish. Overall the fish was very fresh. Rice was cooked to near perfection. Wasabi was really fresh as well.
I see some negative feedback on here, but my experience went damn near flawless. The only minute complaint is that the servers visited the table also nearly too often. Though, I would rather that be the case vs never showing up. The entire experience was great. I would definitely recommend if you are able to take advantage of the LivingSocial deal. If not, its still a great place to grab a quick roll and drink, then move on.

Short story: The yellowtail roll and salmon sashimi were fine, but not outstanding.
Longer story: The restaurant had poor training related to allergies. I have a gluten allergy, which is fairly common. I called ahead to make sure that they could accommodate a gluten allergy, and they said they could and even had gluten-​free soy sauce. But when I told our waiter about my allergy in order to get guidance on the menu, he mumbled something about peanuts. Only after I pressed him did he confess to not knowing what gluten was.
After consulting with the manager, I ordered only off the sushi menu. One of the items I ordered was the lobster and avocado roll. I am fairly certain it contained tempura, possibly mixed into the mayonnaise. I checked on the ingredients before ordering it and double-​checked after the first bite, when I thought it tasted a little too good (in a tempura way), but the waiter assured me there was no tempura in it. Well, the state of my guts the next day told me otherwise. Restaurants need to either train their staff on gluten allergies or admit to customers with allergies that they can’t provide safe food.
One final complaint relates to the restaurant’s handling of our Groupons. We went with another couple and wanted separate checks. Each couple had a $ 20 Groupon. The restaurant told us that they would only honor one Groupon per table even though (a) we were getting separate checks and (b) they were also offering a $ 40 Groupon. Technically, they were right that the fine print said «limit one per table.» But what’s the difference to them if we have two $ 20 Groupons or one $ 40 Groupon? That rubbed me the wrong way. The point of a Groupon offer is not just to get customers in the door; it’s to make them like the place and *want* to come back – good customer service would go a long way toward that end.

If I could give this place a zero, I would. Please look back on my review history and note that I do not give poor reviews often, but when I do, I mean them. Unfortunately, I mean this one too.
My girlfriend and I were really excited to try this place. We love sushi, and there really isn’t anywhere to go in the neighborhood that we have really enjoyed. So, when a deal for this place popped up, I pounced! So, obviously there were high hopes for Chinamoto. However, as our evening progressed, our expectations were lowered and lowered.
First, when we walked in, they asked us to wait a few moments as they cleared a table. So, we elected to sit at the high tops in the bar area. Little did I know that the chairs they bought for the high top tables were about two to three inches too low. This was not that big of a deal for me, but my girlfriend is smaller, and she almost looked like a child trying to reach up for her food. Not going to lie, it was entertaining, but not so comfortable for her.
Second, it took about ten to fifteen minutes for our waiter to come over for our drink order. I ordered the Inyuahsha cocktail and my girlfriend got the Naruto cocktail. At this time I also ordered our dinner, since it took so long. We ordered gyoza for appetizer, and four special rolls for dinner. The gyoza came out, and we ate it. THEN, our drinks came out. And they sat at the bar until the first round of sushi came out, which was about another ten minutes.
The gyoza was nothing special. The cocktails were also nothing you couldn’t make at home with the right ingredients. The sushi then came out. The other three rolls were pretty decent. Honestly, I wish I could remember their names, because it was clear the sushi chef was trying to be inventive with some pepper eel sauce. But, overall there was nothing to die for. The fourth roll was horrible. If you go, and see something with cream cheese in the name, just know that they really mean cream cheese. I know it says there is fish in there, but there is not. It was cream cheese wrapped in seaweed and rice… so unfortunate.
In an attempt to salvage a pretty horrible service experience, and a pretty mediocre food experience, we ordered another cocktail, and, eventually, asked for the check. Unfortunately, as we go to pay, they refuse to honor the deal that we purchased. We asked to speak to the manager, because hey, we ordered a lot of OK food with bad service plus drinks to boot — our bill was not cheap at almost $ 18 per sushi roll. the manager comes to speak to us, pointing to some small disclaimer in the fine print. That was it for me. OK sushi, bad service, bad management. Nope, I will not being going back.
I shall continue my search for good sushi in the area.

The first thing you notice when you step inside this new Pan-​Asian restaurant in Philadelphia is how beautiful it is. The lighting, the tables, the décor are all cooly modern with a total Asian flair that instantly makes a statement. The second thing I noticed when I stepped inside was how few people there were in it, Why? Okay it is a few steps south of Center City, it is not the top Asian restaurant in the city … but it has good food served by friendly people in a beautiful atmosphere. And for those driving, street parking is available. What’s not to like?
I ordered from the Japanese section of the menu and my friend from the Thai section. The soft shell crab tempura was indeed tasty as were the harumakis and satays. I had a Katsu for my main course that came out just as I would have expected and my friend’s Thai Kheng beef dish was flavorful enough but definitely didn’t live up to the spicy moniker. You just have to add some Sriracha sauce for that.
I do hope Philly gets out and supports this place so it sticks around. It’s a really fine addition to the scene at the lower end of the Avenue of the Arts and once you go there, I think most people will like it.

I’ve only been there twice but its the best. I got the spicy maki combo. It comes with three rolls and soup or salad for $ 15. The salad was the best dressing at a Japanese place I’ve had. Sometimes I think the ginger dressing is too sweet but this one is perfectly sweet mixed with salty peanutty flavor. The sushi is expertly rolled. Perfect amount of rice. I had the mojito and it was excellent as well. Outside seating is nice and inside it’s absolutely gorgeous.
One star off because I think it’s over priced. Not the sushi, but the Thai and Chinese dishes are a little too much. For example, my friend got chicken curry for $ 15. She said it was very good, Its just not worth $ 15 for what you get. The bathroom also smelled like a fish tank. Ew.
I highly recommend for sushi though.

the place look fancy but with reasonable pricing :)
We ordered:
Crispy Spicy Tuna Gyoza –Guacamole spicy sweet mayo and truffle oil…
not spicy at all, not even a hint but pretty tasty overall. soft and crunchy texture
Sizzling Duck with brown rice –Roasted boneless duck with special sauce. Served with white or brown rice… a bit salty but i guess it is meant to be eaten with rice. it’s just plain Peking duck with some sauce and steam veggie. … i wouldn’t order this again…
Colorful Naruto Roll-​Fresh salmon, tuna, yellowtail, crab meat & avocado wrap with fresh cucumber sheet (No Rice) in ponzu sauce… the roll was good but i would love to have it a bit more crunchy
ordered some cocktails… i say don’t waste your money on the cocktails :)
desserts:
we ordered crème brûlée & berries but they didn’t have berries so they gave us some mandarin tangerines. NOT A FAN because i can make crème brûlée a lot better than them. especially when it comes out half hot and half cold.
we also tried to order some pistachio dessert but they didn’t have it either. :(
service, our waitress was friendly and out going… awesome. love that kind of people who works in the restaurants industry …
OVERALL. they’re doing OK for a new place… i will give this place another chance before i say «peace out» :)

Ace! The menu is so extensive: you can have sushi rolls, thai dishes, chinese dishes, entrees, salads, alcohol, or dessert.
I had the tempura seaweed wrapped in mozzarella cheese & jalapeño (SO GOOD). The vegetable tempura sushi rolls were also awesome. The portion sizes were just right, and it was all very affordable.
Since it just opened, there are no crowds. The staff was very attentive. Beautiful décor. In sum, I’m very excited that this place opened!