Ikko Japanese Cuisine

做有用的事， 說勇敢的話，想美好的事， 睡安穩的覺，把時間花在值得你珍惜的人身上 ～

Ikko ， 在 Costa Mesa 開至少十幾年的老店了，應該很多人來過，會來這家是女兒推薦， 她爸爸去年帶他們來過， 一直跟我說好吃，他們的 omakase 一個人是120 元， 以現在來說， 比大部分的 omakase 店家都便宜， 若要再加 uni ， 是額外的16 元， 吃這種omakase 我不是很在行， 倒是跟我一起去的朋友說 還是我們工業市的 sushi yuan 划算， 雖然晚上價格是兩百多， 但食材， 味道，擺盤都更勝一籌， 我倒覺得這是一家老闆用一生心血認真經營的小店， 沒有任何花俏的手法，但每道魚片配的剛剛好，刀功也是很了得，是有真功夫的日本老師傅，裡面只有十個位置， 只做晚上， 要打電話預約！ -- at Ikko Japanese Cuisine.

Hey Sushi lovers
This is Hidden Gem
Excellent food for Great value.
My new favorite spot after long time to seeking a true taste of sushi from quality to quality, all the services and the chef are very professional. Oshima have been one of my fav. spot but after horrible food served at ours table I have not go back there for a while. So sad
But today my friend recommend me this one and I already felt into it.
The place are very small. Be sure to make a reservation by phone call.
Keep in your mind this place for who one only love the omakase. They not gonna serve you any American rolls so please dont bother the Chef LOL.
Just sit and watch Chef will server you like a King or Queen.
OMG dont know how to describe. Just wanna say ARRIGATO!!!! I WILL BE BACK SOON.

I ate at Ikko once. I would go there again very gladly.

They were offering omakase before it became a craze attracting too many proprietors who did to it what they had already done to sushi in general, degraded the quality in order to pursue popularity. A little sign here warns prospective diners they simply do not deign to offer American style rolls, the type with fanciful names for inane blends of incongruous tastes.

I was there while on a business trip. I was accompanied by a consultant we had hired. We were a bit late for our reservation. They almost turned us away. That strictness is good. It shows they need to maintain discipline for the dishes to come out appropriately, paced to nearby tables.

The truth is I went in with ambivalence. I was not sure the experience would be worthwhile. DTLA has such wonderful, once in a lifetime fresh fish at nondescript spots. This venue has a similar vibe of better than you would expect for the setting: surrounded by mundane businesses.

Everything was flawless. That is an understatement because it is about what is absent. Everything was great in the ingredients, the preparation, and, as importantly for the occasion, the presentation. Yet there was no pretense. Folks working there know they are at the top of their game. The patrons benefit.

10/10 the BEST omakase and meal I have ever had!

Make sure to call in advance to reserve!

The chef takes his time to create each piece into absolute perfection and every single thing we were served was gold. Ikko is not a standard omakase that just serves different types of nigiri - every bite takes you to the next level of high quality ingredients + an explosion of unique flavor combinations. If you pay attention to the chef's preparation, you'll notice he never forgets to brush on a sauce for each nigiri. It is such a game changer!

At the end of the course, you can choose to re-order anything that you liked + be notified if they are offering any specials for an extra cost (uni was the special during our visit). It was so difficult choosing a specific item since we loved everything but eventually we ordered another Ocean Trout nigiri that took the longest preparation but was well worth the 2nd bite. The uni nigiri was also fresh and tasty.

A big shoutout to the amazing staff and the chef for taking us on this newfound flavor journey that blew us away. This was the most amazing way for us to celebrate our anniversary - we will definitely be back soon!

Friend treated me to Ikko's amazing omakase for my birthday. And easily, it's one of my top favorite omakase places to visit.

Sushi chef curated each dish to be so pleasing to the eyes and sensational to the palate. The presentation is nothing fancy like your Michelin-rated restaurants, but the cuts are so carefully crafted/sliced. The cuts are so clean, and beautifully placed over a bed of rice. The fish looks fresh and taste exactly how it looks.

By far better than some of the Michelin-rated sushi places I've been to. And definitely better than the overly hyped locations.

LOCATION: Bristol/Baker

PARKING: Small lot with a few spots in the front, but it wasn't hard to find at all because it's a small plaza!

Only a 2-month late review, but that doesn't change my feelings toward Ikko.

As you walk towards the entrance, you will see a large, wooden door. The interior is calm, serene, and perfectly dimly lit. The bar around the chef seats ten people I believe. Between each party is a plastic barrier, which I really appreciated considering COVID and how close we are seated next to each other.

Every dish was phenomenal! Some of my favorites included the ocean trout & toro. So yummy. The dessert at the end was a simple vanilla ice cream topped with pistachios and a red wine berry sauce! It was a nice palette cleanser.

What I loved most about Ikko was how attentive the servers were. They would literally refill my tea to the top after every two sips. I got my own teapot and everything expecting to refill it myself, but I appreciated this effort. Side note - the tea was so good! I believe it was Hojicha, one of my favorites.

Ikko is very affordable for such a high-quality omakase, and I would like to thank the chef for perfecting his craft with evident flavors to all his guests!

This was our first time eating at Ikko since the pandemic and a lot has changed - unfortunately not changes we enjoyed.

Now they only offer 2 seating times: 5:30pm & 7:30pm.

They only serve a $120/person Omakase on a set menu and everyone receives the same thing all at once. Everyone sits at the sushi bar (10 seats) and gets their food brought out at the same time. We sat on the end of the sushi bar on the right side and we always got our food last - which was annoying because the last pieces were often the ones that weren't cut as thick (nigiri) so we felt a bit cheated that we were always last. In other Omakase restaurants normally the chef will mix up the order occasionally so the same people aren't fed last for every single course (and we were the first to be seated too so it wasn't like we were late - we were the first ones there). Another annoying thing was there is 1 sushi chef but 4 waitresses and the sushi chef was clearly overwhelmed trying to get all this food out by himself that he didn't once make conversation with us - it was very impersonal like an assembly line despite sitting at the sushi bar. On the flip side, the 4 waitresses was way too many and they felt the need to speed up our meal to make up for the chef taking a long time since it was just him preparing the food so they were always hovering over us, interrupting our conversation with each other waiting for us to eat so they could take away our plates. Since we were always fed last they were constantly hovering waiting for us which was very intrusive and didn't make us feel relaxed.

Unfortunately the variety and quality of the fish has also gone downhill since our last visit. Everything was fine but for the $120 price point we were disappointed to still be hungry after and also not have any fish that was that high of quality. These were the fish we ate:
Scallop
Black sea bream
Golden striped amberjack
White tongue jack
Stone flounder
Grouper
Bassy Chub
Needle Fish
Sweet lip
Cherry salmon
Pike Makeral
Crab & truffle hand roll
Bluefin

So as you can see the only 'higher end' ingredients we got were a smidge of truffle with the crab handroll, a piece of bluefin nigiri and I guess some might call scallop higher end.... We also were offered uni but were told that if we wanted uni we had to pay an additional $$ supplement (in addition to the $120/person). Also at the end we could order more of the nigiri that we had (which we did since we were still hungry) but that brought our total price of the meal up very high for what we received. Also, unlike before where they had a wide variety of fish, they only offer more of what they've already served and that's based on availability if they don't have a full second seating at 7:30pm. They also don't offer all the fun varieties of alcohol and drinks like they used to pre-pandemic.

For dessert it was just ice cream with a couple berries...Meh... For a meal that ended up costing us well around $400 after tax/tip/our add-ons for 2 people you'd think we could get something better than a little scoop of ice cream...

Overall, we were very disappointed and won't be returning. Chalk this up to yet another thing that's not as good as it used to be now post-pandemic....Maybe this is fine for people who aren't used to top notch Omakase but for us who eat Omakase a lot we'll stick to other places that offer higher end ingredients (we don't mind paying more money for higher quality - we just don't like paying a lot of money and not feeling like it was worth it) and where the service is a more pleasant experience.

Waited a long time (from day one opening) to write this review. THANK YOU Ikko-San for all the good times and of course your wonderful culinary experience. I can't say I will miss it because of all the good memories I have.
Arigato Ikko!

Cheers!

頻繁には通えませんでしたが、とても美味しい創作寿司コースのお店でした

残念ながら既に閉店された様で、別のお店に変わっています。
非常に残念です...
I didn't go there often, but it was a very delicious creative sushi course restaurant.

Unfortunately, it seems that it has already closed and has changed to another restaurant.

WE were here to celebrate for our anniversary. It was a reservation Only place because it's by session. So make sure you reservation ahead of time if you plan to eat here. Parking is also limited, so arrive earlier.

The food is absolutely delicious. You will not be disappointed and V.I.P service, too.