Osaka Japanese Steak House & Sushi Bar

Some of the best hibachi in town hands down. I have yet to have a bad experience at Osaka– every time I have gone the wait has been very reasonable, the staff has always been very helpful and the environment is exactly what I would want.
The food is fairly standard as far as this style of restaurant goes — pick your foodstuff, be it chicken, steak, shrimp etc. and watch them cook it in front of you. The soup and salad are nothing extraordinary, but are quite enjoyable nonetheless. The fried rice is always seasoned to perfection, as are the vegetables.
I myself am not much of a sushi person, but whenever I go with family they always order sushi and love every bite.
My regular is the steak and chicken, the steak is always very juicy and extremely well flavoured and somehow I always end up stealing extra chicken from my friends, I suppose that should tell you I like it!
The chefs are all extremely friendly and preform the typical array of tricks, though there are some with special twists depending on who cooks your food.

Good food /​not so great staff…
All three stars are for the food and genial chef. Two stars off for the lousy way we were treated at the end of our meal.
We arrived on a Friday night at 10:10 pm. The advertised closing time was 10:45. Got it: we came in just at the end of the evening. We quickly ordered, and it took our chef about 15 minutes to get to us. He was fine: a couple of opening tricks and he got down to business. We were the only two at the hibachi grill and didn’t expect to see his whole repertoire, but he still gave us proper attention and cooked our entire meal beautifully. That’s when things went south.
After our chef bid us goodbye and we thanked him, we asked our waiter for another hot sake. The bartender came to our table and announced that he had closed out his bar and could not serve us any more hot sake. (Why had they not announced this before?) I asked if we could get a glass of wine. As he turned, I saw his visible body language complaint — as he grunted and begrudgingly fetched me my glass of wine.
Then, our waiter tossed some styrofoam «to go» containers in front of us while we were about half-​way through our meal. As we were finishing our dinner, the clean-​up crew had no problem running vacuum cleaners behind us and past our feet.
When my wife returned from the ladies room she told me that the hall and bathroom were completely dark. I replied that I had no problem seeing; they cranked the lights up full and shut down the soft background music while she was away, turning the recent nice ambiance into that of a school cafeteria. And, oh how efficient was our waiter? He completely left out their dessert choices when he pushed the check in front of my face.
As we were leaving just under an hour after our arrival (about 11:05), I politely complained about our treatment to the bartender. His callous replies showed me that he cared more about defending his position than if I might return.
I would like to recommend Osaka for the cuisine, but I would imagine that this kind of attitude might trickle into their service during busy times as well. The nice thing about Tallahassee is that there are many other good restaurants there. Too bad we won’t be trying Osaka again any time soon.

Big John. Funniest guy and very intertwining

My favorite restaurant in Tallahassee! Food is amazing and the cooks are very entertaining. I go several times a year, and have never left unhappy.
Honey mustard salad dressing is AMAZING! Fried rice and noodles are yummy. Every meal I have chosen has been top notch! Chicken and steak are my favorite.
I always leave with left overs and you can’t beat that!

This is my favorite restaurant! Love the hibachi and their sushi! Delicious food with big portions. I never had issues with service. The setting is beautiful and this place is typically very crowded. Parking lot is small, so expect to park behind the restaurant (which is the more common parking area).

Honestly, save your money. The whole point of Japanese Hibachi is for the show. And they do put on a really good show, and service is great. But I’m not sure that the price for the food is worth it. It tastes very «Americanized» to me. However, I may be biased. I grew up in Miami so I know what REALLY GOOD hibachi tastes like. With that being said, I probably will never go here again.

Fairly standard sushi restaurant. The quality of their sushi did not disappoint nor did it really impress. It’s certainly preferable over Publix or Whole Foods.
What I do appreciate is that their service is fast, so it’s a great place to grab lunch if you have to head back to work in an hour.

Osaka is the best place to get your sushi fix in tallahassee! Coming from new orleans I lived and breathed sushi! I tried a few other places here in Tallahassee but once you try osaka, nothing else in town compares. Don’t get me wrong, they aren’t the best I’ve ever had, just the best I’ve tried since moving to Tallahassee. Sam always makes my sushi fresh and meets my expectations on what good sushi is supposed to taste like. My favorite roll from here is the baked salmon! A definite must try.

Good food quality, friendly staff, good environment. Sushi was fresh and you get your money’s worth. Good job!

We ate here as a party of 12. My sister made the reservation and was told we would have a private room. When we arrived we were told there was no private room available because there was not a chef available and that we would have to dine in a regular table. Would have been fine of the manager hadn’t mentioned that they would open up the private rooms later when the restaurant filled up more. So basically Jo e Schmo can have the private room without requesting it but we couldn’t although it was was we ordered when making the reservation.
All of this would have been fine if the manager wasn’t such a jerk about it. The service was slow on our side of the table but the other side had a different server who was much faster.
Out chef left a lot to be desired. There were two chefs one server each side of the table. We got the dud unfortunately. Osaka definitely doesn’t hold a candle to the rest of the hibachi restaurants in the world.
You could never go in your life and not be missing anything!

This used to be a fun experience… Some of the chefs are getting tired, seriously too worn out with the whole process to keep it up. It’s expensive, but you get a ton of food. You’ll be taking a box home.

The food here is always good.

Bought a Groupon for lunch. Salad swimming in dressing, rice was dry AFTER paying an extra $ 1.50 for fried rice vs. white rice (really?). Not impressed at all.

I don’t like this place. Period. If the only part of my meal that I enjoy at a Japanese Steak House is the rice that’s a problem. I have come here many times (my friends taste buds are off and they love doing birthday’s here?) and the service goes up and down. The Chefs perform better then others at times. But the food remains dull. I don’t care about being entertained if I know my food is going to suck. This place could quickly get better if they did something about having a better bar and actually having a dessert menu. Because this place is complete far from a traditional Japanese Steak House as is. … I had to take a picture of the menu. Which they love to hide the prices on their website. It’s because they are also much more expensive then everyone else in town.

The food here was pretty good. My girlfriend and I came for the hibachi and we each had the sukiyaki steak, which tasted good and came with the standard rice, noodles, and vegetables. Great sized portion, as well. The tea was also tasty and, coming from a person who usually doesn’t like tea, that means a lot. My big gripe with Osaka, however, was the time it took to get the food.
The clock started when we were seated. It took fifty minutes from that point to get our drinks. That’s just unacceptable. Ten minutes after that, we were brought our soup and salad and ten minutes after THAT the chef came and began cooking up the food. I do not know why it took almost an hour for any part of our meal to begin. Receiving drinks should not take more than five to ten minutes, especially when the drinks you order are just sodas.

I am seriously blown away by the poor reviews on here. I no longer live in Tally, but I lived there for 8 years and Osaka was my favorite place for sushi AND hibachi. I was in there at least once per week. Despite living in major cities like Birmingham, AL and Dallas/​Ft Worth Osaka (in tiny old Tallahassee) is still the benchmark against which I compare all Japanese restaurants I visit. Why?
The fish is always FRESH and fabulous. There was seldom a roll that I tried that I did not enjoy. The chefs are constantly trying new things and making up fun specialty rolls. Half the menu didn’t exist when I started going there, they added roll after roll over the years and they just keep coming up with new ones. And, if they make one you like, which doesn’t get added to the menu, they’re still willing to make it if you request it.
The staff are pleasant, and the management is super helpful. They’re always willing to fix their mistakes, if that happens, but it doesn’t come up often. Some reviewers have said ridiculous things like they’ve gone here for years and have had one bad visit and are never going back, which is crazy, every place has their off days. Sure, I’ve had off visits here, but my most recent visit a few weeks ago was AWESOME, some of the best food EVER.
As for the hibachi, I always love a good show. I will admit that sometimes they’re in a rush if it’s busy, and some cooks are better than others, more show-​man-​y than others, but the food is always good. I prefer the shrimp, and the fillet is great, too. The rice (and hibachi noodles) are awesome and worth ordering whether you’re on the hibachi side or sushi side.
Basically, this is the best Japanese place, hands down. You can’t get better sushi or hibachi anywhere in Tallahassee.

If you’ve been to a Benihana or another Japanese hibachi/​sushi place, then you won’t find anything remarkable here. The sushi is better than most places in Tallahassee — probably the restaurant’s biggest plus — but the hibachi is nothing special.
My advice? Come for the sushi, sit on the sushi bar side, and try the spider monkey roll. Delicious stuff.

When I was a Tallahassee resident, this was my favorite spot for Hibachi. I never had the sushi here, so I can’t comment on that. The Hibachi tables were always fun, good food… LOTS of food! Yumm-​O!
Had the funniest experience here with one of the Hibachi chefs. He was very funny, entertaining us with the typical «Japanese accent» and all of a sudden he turns to one of the staff and asks for «ONE SHRIMP» in the clearest, American accent ever. Haha. We loved it.

I’ll start with saying that the quality of fish is good. You aren’t getting «bad» sushi but you definately aren’t getting the best for your money or the area.
I don’t live here but my family does so I’m here 5 times a year and am always eating sushi. Osaka has deent fish but the price is outrageous for the quantity and size. The rolls are tiny and the service sucks.
I’m a sashimi fanatic and for 15 $ at Osaka you can get 9 *tiny* pieces of tuna… blah!!! I also ate at sushilicious and circa sushi this week both of which had AMAZING sashimi and huge roles for half the price of Osaka. And the service was 100 times better at the other places.
Also – beer prices!!! Man! Who pays 5.95 for a 12oz beer??? Not even me!
If you’re in the area… I suggest sushilicous or circa sushi or Lucy hos or even kiku (all of which I will frequent) over Osaka. Just an honest sushi opinion from one sushi snob to another :)

We come here for the sushi and the mixed drinks and always sit in the sushi bar. There is usually not a wait if you are not getting the Teppan-​yaki. Only fools eat that stuff anyways.
The atmosphere is buzzing and encourages you to have a good time. The drinks are great and the Japanese sushi chef will always give you a thumb up if you let out a big burp. House rolls are amazing, and this is the only place I would go for sushi in the Tallahassee area.