Susan Lamberty

Review of Morimoto Restaurant

A horrible experience all around. I came to morimo...

A horrible experience all around. I came to morimoto because I was visiting Philly for business and trust the Stephen Starr brand. Being from Miami, I am a regular at Makoto in the Bal Harbour shops and have had great experiences at Starr restaurants throughout the nation. Given that I trust the brand and the establishment had great reviews I opted for the "Classic" Omakase experience. Having dined at some of the best sushi establishments in the NYC and Tokyo an Omakase experience is traditionally mostly sushi (the highlight of the experience) and a few other dishes. However, at Morimoto a "Classic" | "Omakase" experience is very different. The courses started rolling out: a tuna tartare, a sashimi salad, some weird "tiradito" type dish, and then some seared salmon. Where was the sushi?! At this point I thought to myself "there couldn't possibly be any more hot dishes coming" and then moments later a skate fillet and "palate cleanser " arrive at my table. I didn't eat them and explained to my server that I was expecting sushi and sent back the skate, he came back and told me that the they would cancel the next hot course (REALLY 4 hot dishes) and make me more sushi. More sushi was 14 pieces. Following the sushi came dessert.

When the check arrived I was really upset. I sent (2) courses back and was charged the full $100 for the "Classic Omakase" experience. I am not tasteless and don't go around looking for freebees, in fact I rarely complain about service in a restaurant, but having worked in fine dining for years I was well aware that this situation warranted some form of discount. I spoke to the manager, expressed my concerns about the horribly misleading menu (CLASSIC OMAKASE is not what I got) and he merely suggested that I should have asked my waiter before I ordered it. He did nothing to rectify the situation and was incredibly condescending and rude. I guess no one ever taught him that you should, at all costs, avoid letting a table leave unhappy.

Overall this experience was a HUGE let down, I go to STARR restaurants because I trust the brand, because I know that I will be taken care of. This restaurant does not reflect the quality that I know the STARR group to produce and it is disappointing that this manager was willing to jeopardized my loyalty to the STARR brand. I have spent thousands of dollars at STARR restaurants in Miami, at the very least he could have offered to knock off 10%. All in all I ended up spending $240 on mediocrity at Morimoto. Stay away!