Let me start by saying I read all of the reviews and, although I'm a huge fan of Yama, I thought I'd give this place a shot. After all it has 4 stars with over 400 reviews. A hard enough thing to accomplish right?!
A party of 3 (2 adults and a child), we walk into the restaurant at around 12 on a Sunday and the place is empty with the exception of two people at the bar. We all plan on ordering all you can eat until I hear my 9 year old will be charged full price ($21.95). $22 for a kid that won't eat more than a combined total of 1 roll and a few appetizers. He was disappointed because he was excited at the idea of being able to try different rolls that we ordered. What happened to kids pricing?!? There is no way my child can eat as much as I can.
So moving past this, he ordered off of the kids menu and we ordered two AYCE. The food we ordered came out immediately so no complaints there. Everything we ordered to begin with was delicious.
Tuna carpaccio - 5 stars
Seaweed salad - 4 stars
Green mussels - 5 stars
Vegas Freak (a little on the heavy side but good) - 3 stars
Dynamite - 4 stars
A few different orders of sashimi. - all 5 stars
Teriyaki beef hand roll - 0 stars it was filled with mostly stringy fat, not meat. So gross!
Yum yum scallop hand roll - they brought me the wrong roll. Don't know what it was but it tasted like perfume. Disgusting!
Seafood tostada - 3 stars
Elephant roll - 3 stars
As the restaurant began to fill, the orders began to slow down.... We get to the point where the restaurant is completely packed and there are only two servers and 3 sushi chefs. The servers were working their butts off running food and taking orders but the sushi chefs and the people in the back of the house handling anything needing to be fried or baked were painfully slow. To the point where we ordered 1 roll and waited over 30 minutes to get it. 30 minutes!!!! For a roll that was only 5 pieces!!!
My other issues with the place were that they pack you in like sardines. The place is the size of a shoe box and the tables are literally 4 inches apart. Too close and almost impossible to even walk around everything is so crammed.
Overall, I wanted to love this place. But not everything is ideal for everyone. I enjoyed the majority of the food, appreciated the mostly attentive server and loved the company but I don't think I'll be making my way back anytime soon. If you want better service, amazing food and a little more (barely) room to move around, try Yama!