Benihana (Sackville Street)

We've booked Benihana on the web - 18.-GBP special, for 4. Compared to another Benihana location I visited earlier, this visit was somewhat worse: little air conditioning, poor ventilation, not really busy inside.

Soup and salad were fine but tiny, so-so maki rolls. The chef had some skills but he threw a prawn at me - was I supposed to catch it with my mouth wide open, in flight? He spoiled my 60 GBP new shirt in which I had to visit the Ambassador the next day - and no regret or formal "excuse me". Main course - black cod was tasty but very small portion, about an ounce. Nothing pleasant to tell about.
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Serge P., Canada
Overall rating
Food 5 | Service 4 | Atmosphere 3 | Value for money 3
Wednesday, July 02, 2008

In a nutshell: Food is not very good nor authentic. You come here for an experience, with the chef's doing cooking on the hot plate in front of you.

The menu is limited and very expensive. The cheapest set meal was a special, for about £17 a head. The soup was a tiny portion, the salad was a few strips of iceberg with not much else and a strange dressing. The sushi came out but without wasabi for any of us. The main was much more generous in portion size but totally lacked any seasoning or flavour. The 2 sauces provided were not your usual and most agreed didn't taste nice (10 of us). We ended up asking for soya sauce, chilli sauce and any other sauce they could offer. Beware - we were charged for the chilli sauce. The fried rice was really poor too.

The chef was fine, and the theatricals were fun, but you do get the sense that he's done it 100's of times before and it's rather routine.

It was very very hot in there and the staff were like trainees on their first busy night. They rushed us, were not as friendly nor helpful as we would have expected from location/class/price of this venue.
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Jenny Man
Overall rating
Food 1 | Service 3 | Atmosphere 6 | Value for money 2
Thursday, June 26, 2008

Today I went to Benihana with my family.

I was surprised that their skill was not good enough.

The seasoning was just salt, pepper and soy sauce which I thought was really boring.

Just the name of the restaurant is famous but the food is not special at all. It is just a normal food.

The eating irons (dishes) seemed to be quite cheap.

I would not go there again.
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Overall rating
Food 2 | Service 7 | Atmosphere 4 | Value for money 2
Sunday, March 09, 2008

I have experienced quite a few fantastic teppanyaki meals in various european cities but was very unpleasantly surprised when I brought my partner for a what I thought would be a great experience. This place is grossly overpriced, our chef was not skilled at all and the ventilation system of the place does not work at all. Although the ingredients (being prepared in front of you on a stainless steel grill plate, hence the thick smoke in your face and clothes) looked like they were of good quality, the chef overcooked each of them, (shrimp, lobster as well as fillet steak). He wasn't entertaining at all (one of the merits of this type of meal) and the biggest problem was the thick cloud of food smell hanging in the place. I asked twice if the extractor fans could be switched on and despite claims that they were switched on, they clearly weren't because the smoke was visibly escaping the ventilator into the restaurant. I had other obligations that evening and smelled like grilled salmon all night. For a 120 pound bill for the two of us I think this place is a rip off. We were in and out within 90 minutes; we hadn't even finished our deserts when staff started spraying chemicals on the grill plate so that they could welcome the next round of customers. I would like to experience some proper teppanyaki in London but certainly won't go here again. A disgrace.
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Overall rating
Food 2 | Service 2 | Atmosphere 2 | Value for money 0
Friday, February 22, 2008

I was surprised to find very few restaurants in the CIty Centre offer Teppenyaki. I had experienced this in Sydney and wanted to book a 'thank you' meal for customers.

Even booking 3 weeks in advance the restaurant (for a Tuesday night) was fully booked however they did manage to get us in for an early booking at 6.30pm which was perfect.

Originally we had 10 in our group, when only 9 turned up the staff were wonderful in reorganising the table for the nine guests, only to reorganise it back again, with a smile on their faces when the 10th person did turn up.

The food was excellent. £50 per head and we had lobster, rare fillet steak, freshly cooked vegetables and all this with the entertainment of our chef, Tom.

Altogether an excellent evening - will be revisiting for sure!!
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Sarah Jane
Overall rating
Food 8 | Service 10 | Atmosphere 8 | Value for money 8
Friday, November 23, 2007

Very expensive mistake

Avoid like a plague where do I start!!!

Not a comfortable atmosphere at, no ambiance – in an out in just about 1.5 hrs and that was stretching it.

Not enough chefs so you will not get a booking easily even thought the restaurant is more than half empty (Fri).

When the chef did arrive, he was over and done with us within about 45 mins so that was eating your starters and main meal. Chef was good with the knife and some jokes but was not inspiring or very funny!

We ordered specials etc. e.g. Lobster special had 4 prawns for a starter and a piece of lobster and some small pieces of chicken breast £40!

The chef grilled them put some salt and lemon and that was your dinner with some ginger/onion and mustard mayo type relish…. I asked for some chilly sauce and they said they had peri-peri (this is Japanese cuisine) and I got a little dollop of wasabi after I asked for it. Oh, the chef had some sauce in one of those tacky plastic greasy café bottles which contained tomato sauce and soya sauce…. What!!

Oh, you got a fried onion slice, 1 whole mushroom, 2 asparagus tips and some bean sprouts, a tiny bowl of salad avoid, lukewarm onion soup and that was your lot.

Not a place, to socialize, celebrate or indeed enjoy good food!!. Unless you have a special price deal to eat there

Certainly a place to waste money on a full price menu .

If you want to donate, find a worthy cause!.

Go to a proper Japanese restaurant for a better meal for half the price!!

A far cry from the way it is done in the US and elsewhere at moderate prices.

Bad. Bad. Be wary! Be very wary!
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Overall rating
Food 0 | Service 0 | Atmosphere 0 | Value for money 0
Friday, October 05, 2007

I ate in Benihana last week with a couple of my friends. It was our first time to eat in a Teppan yaki style restaurant. We stared with a special Japanese cocktail called Osmo. The barman explained what is in and it was a really unique cocktail because there is Japanese SAKE (rice wine) in it. Then we had monthly set meals. There were some choices and we could choose 2 main dishes out of them. The price was reasonable, £16.50, and tasty! We also had appetizer Sashimi which is slices of raw fish. Salmon Sashimi was amazing! And the best part of our experience was the entertaining chef. He was juggling, singing, making jokes while cooking. We loved it! I want to have a big party with many friends next time. Definitely recommendable!
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Malaga
Overall rating
Food 8 | Service 9 | Atmosphere 8 | Value for money 8
Saturday, September 08, 2007

Very expensive for what it is. Great entertainment though, brilliant if you go as a grou of 8 as well as you get your own chef. Bit weird sitting with strangers though but it is a fun and different experience. Sadly just very over priced for what it is though!
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L Holt
Overall rating
Food 6 | Service 6 | Atmosphere 10 | Value for money 4
Friday, August 31, 2007

Went to this restaurant with a friend over the weekend. Thought the deal with 7 courses was quite ok. What I was really disappointed about was the unfairness of the chef. We have 6 people on the table, and everyone went for the meal deal with the 7 courses. I couldn't believe it when the chef when distributing the food was totally unfair, we missed out on some grilled Veggies . When He came to us, he just said : Oh. Sorry, there wasn't enough for you both. Er... can't he tell when he is distributing it to know that he has to feed 6 people?!???!!! I can't help but feel we were being discriminated for some reason.

We didn't make a fuss as I thought maybe he'll make it back to us and cook some more later ....but he didn't!!!!

I thought the chef was very unprofessional by not distributing the food evenly, I felt kinda cheated, paid the same amount of money as the others, but didn't get what they got. For this reason, we will not be visiting this restaurant again. Not to mention, the food was only mediocre.
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pinkynana
Overall rating
Food 5 | Service 3 | Atmosphere 3 | Value for money 5
Monday, June 25, 2007

In my opinion the only reason to visit Benihanas is not for the very average extremely overpriced food its for the show.I have been many times to similar type restaurants and always enjoy watching the chefs more than the food so what better place to bring my friends who were visiting London i thought, i couldnt have been more wrong. So much for "being dazzeld by the chefs cooking skills" he had no skills, and when i questioned as to why our chef simply cooked while other tables were treated to the dazzling cooking display that Benihanas is famous for, i was told he was a training chef!!! so all in all it was a waste of time the £50per head would have been better spent in a restaurant with good food. I definitely would not recommend Benihans to a friend.
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Overall rating
Food 4 | Service 2 | Atmosphere 0 | Value for money 0
Monday, February 19, 2007