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Read MoreDozo Izakaya Opens, Initial Reactions Not Favorable
I wrote a little while ago that a new izakaya restaurant was opening outside my place and I was excited to see what it would be like. There are so many good places to eat in Richmond but hey, never hurts to have another.
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Dozo opened about two weeks ago and I snapped a shot of the place at night. I still haven’t gone though. I was going to but after I walked up to it, I saw a notice on the door, alerting diners that they had not yet received their liquor license and could not serve any alcohol. I don’t know about you but eating izakaya food with non-alcoholic beverages just seems…wrong. And so, I will wait until they can serve me a beer before giving it a shot.
I did read a few reviews of the place and so far, people aren’t liking it. One member of REVscene.net, a local message board I help moderate, says:
I went to Dozo yesterday. They said they just opened this week. Currently, they are not serving alcohol as their liquor license has been delayed.
Overall, I was quite disappointed with the quality and value of food offered. I ordered four things (I would have ordered more, had it not suck so much): Supreme Sashimi Salad, Croquette, Ebi Mayo, and Short Ribs.
The veg and vinaigrette in the salad was fine, but the fish they used was terrible. It was the same quality as you would find at [Samurai Sushi]. The croquette was decent, but bland in the inside. (Compare this to the awesome crab croquette at 1215.) The grilled short ribs had a decent flavor but was thinly cut and dry. It felt and looked like something cooked at home. Lastly, the Ebi Mayo. I always look at the Ebi Mayo as the barometer of the quality of cooking in an izakaya, and I couldn’t believe how bad it came out at Dozo. The Ebi Mayo came slightly cold, the batter was not crispy, and the shrimp did not test fresh at all. It was like I got Ebi Mayo at Richmond Sushi.
The other thing I found odd was there were two pages worth of Taiwanese dishes on the menu, like “three cup chicken” and “black pepper pork”.
The prices at Dozo are quite high. The average price per dish is $6-8. This is like Hapa or ShiruBay prices. Compare this to Guu, which ranges from $4-6 per dish.
Service was pretty bad too, but I let it slide since it just opened.
If you are interested in good izakaya food, make the effort to go downtown and hit up Guu, Hapa, Kingyo, ShiruBay. It is well worth the extra time and cost of gas.
I edited some of the spelling since no one on REVscene save for a few of us can spell properly. Either way, that’s a fairly poor reaction to the place and I found myself less excited after reading that and other poor reviews (there are several in the thread and elsewhere on the net) but nevertheless, I will find a day to go and find out exactly how it is myself after they get a liquor license.
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- 4 Comments
- In Food and Fine Dining
It sounded like it had promise too. To bad it’s a disappointment. On a side note, in the picture you provided, that’s a pretty interesting colour reflection in the water. Do they have coloured lights under the awning or…?
Replyman…i feel so spoiled. i work right next to J-town in downtown LA and there are some bomb-ass izakaya spots i try to hit up at least once a month (there are a lot in OC too). and i agree about the no-alcohol thing. we always gotta start off with a pitcher of kirin.
ReplyWe have several amazing izakaya places in Vancouver…this just probably isn’t one of them.
ReplyVerdict: Chinese restaurant trying to mask itself as a “Japanese” Izakaya. Nice decor but FOOD IS BAD!!! Babel blaring too loud on the audio system. Avoid this place. Go to Costco and put your $ down on a hot dog if you are really hungry, or drive downtown or a place around 71 and Oak if you want a Japanese cook.
The gist:
Do not know why Dozo so busy. I guess it is the Asian mentality to try a new place, but I hope people realize the quality of food they are serving is sub-par.
My experience from having dinner there yesterday:
Supreme Sashimi Salad - A hand full of mixed greens, cold dead raw fish ends consisting of salmon, tuna and maybe some hamachi and probably Costco bought sesame dressing. The least they could do is put in a few pieces of Hokkigai and real sashimi pieces, not fish ends. And yea, did I mention the sliced onion was frozen. 10 bux! Wow there is value for your $, fish ends.
Grilled Onigiri - This was edible, but rice was mushy and overcooked. Better to be had from a Japanese grocery store like Fujiya.
Tuna Tataki - The ponzu was weak, tuna tataki was ok, pieces cut too big/thick; sitting on a bed of cold (almost frozen) onion with some radish sprouts, I think I could almost count how many sprouts they used. Food is about presentation and feel in your mouth as well as taste.
Grilled Sirloin Beef: They put this in the Grilled section, you would expect a piece of cooked meat say done rare, medium, well done etc. What you get: Chewy Beef Tataki with some bastardized sweet
Sambal Oelek (Hot chili sauce) on top. Item in wrong section!! A baby corn split in half and yes you guessed it, TWO, count them TWO frozen pieces of Broccoli!! They already have beef carpaccio in the appy section, why two raw beef dishes and beef so thick you can’t chew. I ate one piece from this dish and left the rest.
We complained about the frozen and raw beef dish, the server tried to please us by giving us 10% plus not paying for the cold dead cow plate but then came back and said manager rather give us 20% and pay for a plate we are not going to eat. How about that! Thanks!
And finally another server asked us why we didn’t eat our food… anyhow, we just wanted to get out of there instead of making a scene. We paid and left. A real restaurant wanting return customers would have given us the meal free or at least take the item off the bill, they did neither. Talk about just trying to suck money.
Well, to sum it up, as is, a 7/11 that was there served better food. They better get their act together fast or they will end up closing in 6 months when they have expired the entire Richmond population for 1 time visits.
Advice to the cook, go eat at some real Izakaya downtown and see what it is suppose to be and defrost and cook your food.
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