Teppanyaki Restaurant

I came here on Friday night with a friend for a catch up as we both had a craving for some Teppanyaki and found ourselves in China Town.
I have been to Teppanyaki restaurants in the past and have always enjoyed them — having the food cooked in front of you adds an entertainment value which is great fun.
The staff in here are great — the service i cannot fault at all. From the moment we arrived they were polite and gave us time to look through the menu in the small bar area before showing us to our seats. We asked the waitress if we had the set courses, would we need a sushi starter as well? She said no, and mentioned that the set menu would easily be enough food. I appreciated her honesty as i was just about to spend a further £18 on 8 pieces of Nigiri Sushi and California Rolls.
My scarf kept falling off the back of my chair when people brushed past me, and the waitress kept picking it up and placing it back on my chair. This must have happened 5 times — very kind.
We both opted for the ‘Teriyaki Kyoto’ set teppanyaki menu at £24.95 each. This consisted of Zensai, which was a small starter dish of some wontons and spring rolls. A choice of either Sirloin Steak or Chicken Fillet cooked on the teppanyaki grill and egg and vegetable fried rice and stir fried vegetables too.
We both opted for steak and the waitress was right — this was plenty of food.
Our chef was polite and our food was served quickly. the rice and stir fry veg was particularly good, and the steak was cooked how i like and was juicy and tender.
However, the chef went crazy with the soy sauce on my steak, and whilst this is fine for some people, this made my steak very salty.
I can’t help but compare this place to Sapporo Teppanyaki — where it’s only £21 for a filet steak cooked with rice, veg and potatos — so i found this restaurant particularly expensive in comparison.
And like i said, whilst the chef was polite, there wasn’t the same entertainment as there is at Sapporo — which did leave me a little disappointed.
But, all in all, the food was nice and it’s a nice restaurant.

We had booked a table at Teppanyaki for our company Christmas event, something everyone was looking forward to. At the time of booking, and on a followup confirmation call we had it confirmed that both vegetarian and gluten free menus could be provided.
On walking in, everyone was a little taken aback by the décor. 70s strip club would do as a description; mirrored ceilings, dim lights and an overwhelming odor of bleach. At least it gets cleaned, I suppose! Next up and sat at our table, the waitresses, without a word, approached from behind and put cloth bibs on everyone! I can see why this is done, after all teppanyaki eating has the potential to be a little messy, but the bibs could be optional or a joke could be made out of wearing them but an ambush by the mute waiting staff took everyone by surprise.
Taking our orders was a similarly non communicative event, vegetarian options consisted of an aubergine side dish unless we ordered a full 6 course set menu. No flexibility, none of the parts of the set menu could be ordered separately, just the aubergine side dish. No discussion would be entered into, and the aubergine dish was duly written down without actually being ordered!
Next the gluten free order. We simply said that as arranged in advance, we would need the gluten free option. On booking, we’d been told that the chefs could use gluten free soy sauce without issue. The waitress said there was no such option, and the best they could do was some dry protein (fish or meat) and some boiled rice. They did say that the dipping sauces were free of soy, but it’s a good job someone asked that the chef be consulted as they were both soy based sauces. The waiting staff could do with being told what they’re serving, and educated as to the dangers of serving gluten to a coeliac.
At this point we decided to cut our losses but since a deposit had already been paid, we split our group in two and some people left. Hardly ideal for a Christmas party.
When the food arrived it was as you’d expect for a teppanyaki place, some of it even quite good but the evening had by this point been spoiled. None of our group will be returning.

Great food and a great experience, watch them cook your food on a hot plate in front of you.

One of the best places that I have ever eaten in Manchester, Teppanyaki is a really fun Japanese restaurant. The basic set up is that you all sit round as the chef grills your meat. The menu is limited in the sense that it is meat + rice + sauce but it all tastes so good you won’t care. And there are actually tons of different meat and sauce to choose from — we had beef, duck and salmon.
I went with a big group and it is definitely a special occasion restaurant. I spent much more than I usually do but it was really good fun and some of the sauces made it taste incredible.
By far the most entertaining part of the evening was our chef. As we watched him it became clear he didn’t speak much English so he made all the animal noises relating to what he was cooking at the moment. Quacking and mooing galore. Rest assured there was nothing lost in translation: both he and his food were a big hit with me and my friends.