Saikai
“The foie gras rice is yummy and the duck breast is just a fun dish to watch :)”
“As for food, we got two uni toast, two uni yuba, one toro, one mushroom w/ truffle, miso black cod and for dessert, pistachio cake and sorbet.”
“Strongly recommend:
Uni toast for starter;
Almost everything from the raw bar tastes fresh and great;
Lobster rice;
And also Ginger brûlée”
Saikai
Takes Reservations: Yes
Accepts Credit Cards: Yes
Bike Parking: Yes
Good for Groups: Yes
Waiter Service: Yes
PokéStop Nearby: Yes
Price range.
$$$ Price range $31-60
8 reviews
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Maybe it's because I come with the right group. Everything here is so good. We had quite a few dishes to share. The first is uni yuba, which has fresh uni on top of baked tofu and green bean smash in between. Perfect. We also had wagyu sushi and salmon rice. The spicy duck breast is fried to the right amount as well. The foie gras with duck breast is great. Not Oily at all. They also serve dessert. The soba pudding and seasonal Sakura cake are probably top in the city. I'll definitely come back sometime and maybe try the Tuesday chef tasting ($75), which is highly recommended by my friend.
The only good thing here was the grilled mushrooms and the sake. Everything else was fairly bland or just average. The vegetables had no flavor. The uni was likewise flavorless. Not cheap either.
Great spot for a modern but largely authentic taste of Japanese food. There is a chef's counter and overall great spot for lone diners.
The cucumber salad (5/5) – refreshing and expertly sliced to be like cucumber I've never seen before
Bluefin tuna with wasabi (3/5) – slices of bluefin with specks of fresh wasabi looks like a work of art. Overall good but maybe too familiar flavor profile. Would have tried the other fish but the server himself hadn't sampled it so couldn't tell me anything about it.
Uni rissoto (5/5) – really strong uni flavor and this is basically an umami bomb. It wasn't so rich I couldn't eat the whole thing myself but it is intense. Probably one of the best renditions of this dish I've had
Service was attentive and on point. I'd return.
Cannot believe the amount of spare tables at this place. I suppose it was a Tuesday but still… We are in NYC.
Each dish was delicious ! We had:
* Mushroom roasted with egg AMAZING
* Tuna tartare FRRESH AND DELICIOUS
* Smoked Duck Breast W/Foie Gras THE MOST AMAZING DISH ever!
Do it. Totally unexpected. Service was amazing, great decor .. Coming back!
Loved this quiet little Japanese spot last night. When I arrived, it was empty… A scary sign but the food was phenomenal. We ordered a bunch of plates to share: Brussel sprouts, cucumber salad, ceviche, a hand roll, a BBQ chicken roll, miso cod and the matcha katagori dessert.
My favorite dish was the miso cod. It had the perfect blend of sweet and savory flavors. The sushi was very fresh and portions were not overwhelming.
The shaved green tea ice was special. I kind of felt greedy but could have finished a whole one by myself. I would highly recommend this restaurant if you are in the area.
Come here if you are an uni lover! The uni risotto was definitely our favorite dish of the night. The other things we had were: uni yuba, smoked duck breast with foie gras, a special grill fish dish for the night (i dont remember the name) and yuzu sorbet for dessert.
The uni yuba was ok as a dish. The uni itself was really good but eating everything together, I think the sweetness of the uni was covered by the saltiness of the other things.
The smoked duck breast with foie gras was nice but nothing that creative, same goes for the special grilled fish. They tasted just kind of basic and can be found generally else where. None the less, they were preatty good.
We also really enjoyed the yuzu sorbet. It was light and the taste was perfect between sweet and bitter. They also added a surprise candy that you should try!
The portion in general was pretty small. They also has a very extensive lost of sakes and also come with sake pairings. We would come back again for more uni!
Wow.. this place is really good. From the service to the food, everything we had was amazing. They start you off with a sake/alcohol list. My friend and I weren't sure if we wanted to drink since we both dislike sake. One of the servers overheard us and offered us a tasting of three sakes to help us decide. We thought this was very nice of him! We ended up ordering one of the plum wine sakes. It was good.
Now on to the important part – Food.
I am an uni lover so we ordered –
-Uni yuba – Delicious! Uni on top of two pieces of yuba (tofu skin) with edamame puree.
-Oyster ceviche special – This one was good but my friend and I would've liked it to have been a little more acidic because after a while it was getting kind of fishy. They had some chopped up oysters, scallops, shrimp, uni and a few pieces of cherry tomatoes
-Tuna of the spine special – It sits on top of some scallions with wasabi all over the plate. It was very fresh but I would've liked more even pieces of fish. Some were very chopped up and some where huge pieces. But this was still one of my favorite dishes of the night
-Uni risotto – I would definitely recommend to share this the first few bites were delicious but then it just got too heavy. Creamy risotto with chunks of uni on top and mixed in.. Definitely try it if you are a uni lover.
This review is PURELY BASED ON THEIR BAR EXPERIENCE
Location: Saikai is bit hard to look for if you want to find it intentionally. But if you are just wondering around at West village, this may be easier to find. Why? Because I found this place by accident.
The inside decoration is interesting, very Japanese version decoration but mixed well with some American elements in it. They have bar and dining places. We were there for the bar experience because they have 6 buck wine special that night. Yay, who doesn't want 6$ wine.
And they also have a special occasion to promote one of their most pricy sake – 359 for a bottle, whereas that day, we tasted for free.
Bar: Lets start with the sake. It is very smoothy. The quality is pretty high, I would say but the price never came cheap.
I had their Italian wine… It's a red wine. I don't know why but the wine taste really unpleasant.. reminded me an experience that I did on wine: if you leave the wine bottle open up and for few days… the good wine turns to be a sour wine… this is the case tho…
My friend 's sake was not pleasant either…
Although it seems to be cheap, it would be very pricy if you come here for a regular day…