2926 Fairview Rd.
Costa Mesa, CA 92626
(714) 557-7313

I joke around a lot that this restaurant is how I knew my boyfriend had good taste in food, but in some ways its true.  Taka Sushi is the best sushi restaurant I have ever been to in Orange County, hands down.

I was raised on sushi.  I learned how to use chopsticks at the age of seven.  Truth be told given a choice and a boundless budget I would probably have sushi twice a week and be perfectly happy.  That is, now that I've found Taka.

Before I would've been happy having sushi maybe twice a week.  I liked sushi a lot, but I didn't love it.  That's how good this restaurant is.  It inspires you to love it.

I didn't realize before how relatively flavorless most sushi is.  Sushi lovers everywhere are probably protesting this even as they read it.  Truly though, once you've had Taka you realize most of the fish you get in most places just isn't that good.  Taka is that good.

I don't know what is in his special sauce, how he perfectly fries the garlic chips, or why the Elsewhere Roll (a combination spicy scallops and asparagus) is so good, but it is.  He offers a very wide menu from Kobe wrapped asparagus, to a huge collection of specialty rolls, most of which I've never seen anywhere else.  Even the straight nigiri (just the fish on rice) is the best I've ever had, being perfectly cut without any chewy membrane and very flavorful. 

He's open for lunch, closed, and then open for dinner because in between he goes and gets more fresh fish.  My favorite thing about this place?  Great service and no pressure to buy alcohol (though he does have a great selection of sake).  It seems like so often now great sushi is accompanied by the suedo-hip atmosphere, poor service (in high heels), and a bar atmosphere that pushes the establishment's drink choice (Geisha House is an excellent example of this).  This place gets a 5 out of 5 no joke.  Its that good.

1547 West Katella Avenue
Orange, CA 92867-3410
(714) 532-4300

Coming out of "Prince of Persia - The Sands of Time" the other day, I was faced with a spattering of restaurants around the theater.  I had been to all of the restaurants around the Century 25, except for two: a new frozen yogurt shop and a restaurant called Prime Cut Cafe, now in the place of the antique car gallery that went out of business.  


I'd looked at their menu a few times, but when my little brother is in tow we can't go to places like this mainly because menu is far to sophisticated for him.  This time he wasn't along so we decided to check this pace out.  Let me preface this review with the fact that this restaurant, despite its menu, is relatively inexpensive.  As a matter of fact, a meal at Bob's Big Boy across the way will cost you about as much. 


The interior of this restaurant is sleek.  Dark leather and dark wood, with metal and glass.  Its practically monochromatic.  The downside of this?  As high class as the restaurant is it looks like a sterile bachelor's pad.  There is no color.  No colored napkins, no flowers, and no art on the walls, just mirrors.  The place frankly looks a little cold.


That, I have to say, would not have been enough to dissuade me from coming back.  The serve was the downfall of this particular restaurant.  We found out far too late that this restaurant does not provide a bread service.  The waitress however did not ask if we'd like to order some bread.  Since it took over 20 minutes for our food to arrive and we were already hungry, this was an important misstep.  


We were also, I have to note, not asked if we would like a glass of wine.  Ironically both my mother and I would've had a glass of wine.  We had water glasses, but they were not refilled regularly and mine spent quite a bit of the meal empty. 

So I had two starters instead of an entree.  Inexpensive appetizers are always a plus because I love doing this.  I ordered the cheese fondue and a starter salad with bitter greens and granny smith apples.  The salad was fantastic.  I love bitter greens and this salad side stepped a problem many apple salads have by slicing the apples thin with a mandolin so they could actually be incorporated with the rest of the ingredients.  It was perhaps a little shy on the better ingredients like candied pecans and cranberries that counteracted the salad's ingredients, but all and all, I enjoyed it.  The cheese fondue however was mediocre.  I thought it was tolerable.  The bread it came with was slightly over charred and the roasted garlic cloves were not quite soft enough to be spread on the bread or mixed into the fondue.  Also my boyfriend and my mother both actively hated the fondue, so I'm being kind.  

My boyfriend ordered clam chowder, which he enjoyed.  It appeared to be a halfway combination between a Manhattan and a New England.  It however had clearly had been sitting under the heat lamps for quite some time.  The top had a skin and the bottom was cold.  Even in an inexpensive restaurant that never should have been allowed out of the kitchen in that condition.  


My mother at least had a good experience.  She loved her French dip sandwich, despite the fact that it was a little short on au jus.  


In any case, we were finishing up our meal.  (At this point we were openly discussing the meal and the lack service.) Then, the manager comes by and asks us how our meal was.  My mom very politely explained the problems we had had with the meal and more specifically the service.  The manager - I wish I was joking - blamed us for not sending back the food, asking for more of deficient items, etc.  We might have asked if the waitress had been around at all, but with an empty restaurant and only 2 other tables to tend to, she wasn't even usually in eye sight.  When we pointed out that we had been left without food for about 20 minutes.  He flat out said: We don't offer bread service, but your welcome to order bread.  He didn't offer us a glass of wine, he didn't apologize, and he did not make any amendments to the bill.  All and all the manager was as bad as, maybe even worse, than the server.

For service and staff as well as some minor problems with the food this restaurant can only get maybe a 2 out of 5.  With the interior, a sound menu, and some clearly decent chefs in the kitchen, this place has some potential, which keeps it from receiving a 1.  I will say that to recover this restaurant the owner will probably have to replace all of the front of the house staff we encountered, provide some sort of pre-meal nibble to cut customer irritation (even if its just chips), and push his wine menu more.  We didn't even receive a wine menu and with their food being inexpensive, they're going to need the sales from alcohol to keep the business afloat. 

That's all on this one readers, keep your eyes out for more reviews soon to come.