@ Home Cafe

While in Akihabara, you have to visit a maid café, right?!
My three friends and I (all guys) picked this place over the Maidreaming ones as those seem more like a chain and more corporate and we liked the pictures of @homecafe.
When we got there we were a little disappointed. The place didn’t look as cool as the pictures. But to be fair, we only went to the 4^th floor and didn’t realize until after that there was more than one floor.
We were quickly greeted and taken to a table. We each picked the most expensive set, which included a drink, meal, dessert, and picture with a maid of our choosing. In the end, we all felt picking the most expensive set was a mistake (more on this later).
I ordered a hot drink only because I wanted a maid to draw something on it. When it arrived at the table, there wasn’t anything on it, but that was because they ask you what you want drawn on it! I asked for a pikachu and was super impressed with how it came out (see picture).
It’s a super cutesy place so of course I ordered the most cutesy thing on the menu, which is the pink curry. When the food arrives, the maid will have you do «magic» so that the food tastes better, and in my case, so that the curry would magically turn pink. So they have you say something like «moe moe cute!!!» which making heart shapes with your hands.
Overall, the food is fine, but it’s not really what the place is about.
Our maid brought us a «menu» with all the girls on it and asked us each to pick a girl. We would be her master and that was the girl you would take a picture with. I know it’s not really feasible, but I wish the girls would stand at the table and you could pick instead of picking from a picture. Maybe whatever girls weren’t busy at the moment could come. We were all scared we picked «the ugly one.»
The girl you picked would call you to the stage and they had props for you to pick from. Most of them were hats. Since we were there in December, they had a lot of Christmas themed items. Then the maid will ask you how you want to pose and they take your picture. They sign it and bring it to your table.
The reason I’m giving this place 3 stars is there wasn’t as much interaction with the girls as we thought there would be. They sat us, tried to explain the sets, took our orders, brought the food, and took a picture with us. Not much different from any restaurant. The only real difference was the «magic» we had to do.
None of the maids spoke good English. Because of this, we felt they didn’t really want to interact with us. At the time we were there, there were two Japanese guys, each sitting by themselves, and they got to interact with the maids a lot more. I think only one maid tried with us. She came over and asked us where we were from and that was about it. If they had tried to interact with us a little more they could have learned that one of us spoke a little Japanese!
This is pure speculation on our part, but we also thought that because we ordered a complete set, that the maids had little incentive to upsell us. It seemed like the two lone Japanese guys only ordered one drink each, and the maids would come over and interact with them and ask to play games with them, while asking/​trying to get them to order more and stay longer.
If you’re in Japan, visiting a maid café is something you should experience. I’d try to find a better spot, but if you can’t this place should be fine.

This was a very cute and unique Japanese experience. Both locals and tourists frequent this maid café but the girls here don’t speak much English so the maid experience is more limited for non-​Japanese patrons. We arrived right after they opened at 11:30am but the place started to get packed by the time we left.
Photos are only allowed of the food/​desserts and drinks on the table. You’re not allowed to raise your camera to take photos of anything else but the maids will gladly snap one of you and the food if you hand them your phone/​camera.
There is a 600 yen admissions/​cover fee and 1 item minimum per person. They also have different combination packages that include getting a Polaroid shot with a maid under their @home café sign by the red curtains (so yes everyone else in the café will see your photo shoot, don’t be camera shy). They’ll present you with a photo cork board of maid choices. More expensive packages include playing a simple children’s game with the maid.
We got the 1 dessert, 1 drink, and 1 Polaroid shot package for 1600 yen each. Not the best dessert but very cute and photogenic. My cheesecake bunny was light and fluffy but bland. The iced mocha and iced matcha drinks were good. Our maid drew the cat and rabbit faces on top of the foam at our table. She also had us chant cute phrases and small gestures with her when the food was presented.
You’re paying for presentation and service by cute Japanese girls dressed up as maids. They’re supposed to call you master or princess but I don’t remember if they did for us. Maybe they greeted us in Japanese? We paid about $ 20 USD per person for a maid café experience. Not bad but I wish they had a maid or two who spoke English so we could get the complete maid experience.

Box ticked.
Not something I would recommend as a must-​do, but if someone wanted to give it a try I would say fine…
Staff were friendly and gushing, as expected.

The first thing I said when I walked in was «This is heaven»
So much fun! Cute girls dressed up like maids that call you master and smile the whole time in a very sweet way. Yes… and more yes!!! A guy’s fantasy for sure.
The place is small, the wait is long and there is an entrance fee if you’re not a «member» but totally worth it to experience it at least once.
The drinks are average, the food is not good but the presentation is the cutest thing EVER!!! Remember this isNOT a restaurant, this is a Maid café guys! It’s all about the experience!
You can’t take pics of the girls unless you pay for a special package but they can take pics of you and your party.
Go and experience it. It’s worth the wait!

Warning: avoid coming alone; the food is not what you come for, it’s about the experience, you can only take pictures of the food, nothing else is permitted.
When walking into the café, you are greeted by a tiny, cutesy Japanese girl dressed in a French maid costume. Everyone’s voice is that high pitched girlish squeal, and they greet you as master or princess. It’s like stepping into an animé cartoon.
We were offered four packages that were a combo of drink, dessert and/​or food and a maid related activity (play a game with or take a picture with a maid of your choosing). Our server maid was very friendly and made a lot of effort in her performance. All of them were very friendly and cute.
The food is all super cutesy, imagine a toddler making food. And all the drinks and desserts taste like its at least ¾ sugar.

Do you like being surrounded by cute girls, cute food, and love people watching? If any of those sound interesting to you, then @Home Café is where you want to be!
A friend recommended this particular café to me when I told him that we were looking for a good maid café in Akihabara. He said that the maids here are the cutest and «most moe.» For those who don’t know what «moe» is, you’re in trouble because I don’t get it much either. From what I’ve gathered, it means when someone or something is just ridiculously cute that your heart wants to burst out of your chest? … not too sure lmao.
Anyway, the maids here were ADORABLE. When you enter, they greet you with «Welcome home, master!» If you’re a girl, they refer to you as princess. OMG. Everyone was ridiculously friendly and, even though my group mostly spoke English, they had one of the English speaking maids help explain the menu to us. She did her very best to ensure that we were having a good time and that we felt, well, at home hahaha.
The way it works is that you have to buy a «set» in order to get certain perks. For example, you all start off by paying an entrance fee of $ 6 or so. You then go through the menu and pick what kind of food set you want. You can get a combo (food + drink) or you can order things individually. Obviously if you order a combo (which is more expensive), you get cool perks like taking a polaroid picture with the maid of your choice. The reason why this is popular is because you are actually NOT allowed to take video or pictures of the maids — only the food!
My boyfriend and I decided to get an entrée set and a dessert set. Both of these sets came with a polaroid. He got the puppy-​styled pancakes (lmao) with some coffee and I got omurice with melon soda. Our maid asked what kind of animal he wanted on his coffee and she drew it with syrup. It was really cute! For the omurice, we didn’t know what we wanted on it… so we asked for Gudetama. She asked for a reference picture and then drew it with ketchup. Pretty crazy!!! The food itself was decent (nothing super crazy) and the sets were a little pricey, but you’re pretty much paying for the cuteness factor and the experience.
There was a segment where they did a dance/​singing routine and had all of us waving wands and chanting and stuff, which was ridiculous but silly. I think my favorite part, though, was being able to people watch. While a fun experience, maid cafes DO attract some interesting characters. Most of them seemed pretty harmless, but one guy actually asked the maid if he could grab her in the polaroid (!!!). Wat.
Anyway, when my bf and I were called to the front to take a picture with our favorite maid, they let us choose accessories to wear (I chose some cute fox earmuffs because I was wearing a scarf!) and then they would ask us what kind of pose we wanted to do. After they took our pictures they sent us back to our tables to finish eating before presenting us with the polaroid and a cute message written on the front!
Overall it was a really exciting experience and, if I ever find myself in Akihabara again, there’s no doubt in my mind that I’d go back in a heartbeat!

After watching the Anthony Bourdain episode in Tokyo, I decided to give this maid café a try (this isn’t the one he went to but same concept). It was a bit awkward and strange to have girls dressed in maid costumes greeting me as «master» and having me repeat «magical» Japanese phrases along with them. The maid my friend and I had spoke some English so she tried to make conversation with us trying to get to know us better and played board games with us. The food was cute to look at, but taste wise it was mediocre. Its a different experience, but one must try while in Japan as we do not have something like this back in the US.

Came in to get out of the rain and kill some time with a drink. Decided to get the caramel mocha. Although the drink wasn’t as good as some of the coffee shops here in Tokyo, a cute maid came and served it to me. It is more entertaining then anything else. There are many other maid cafes here in Akihibara and if seeing cute girls dressed up maids is your thing then it’s a cool place to check out.

What a great experience. I can’t speak a lick of Japanese, but these maids are so friendly and try really hard to communicate with foreign guests, it doesn’t even matter. To get the Full experience, order a set which includes a photo with a maid of your choice. Lot’s of fun. Go to @home café. Don’t go to Maidreamin’. That place is garbage time.

Nice atmosphere with cutesy maids. Food was super cute looking. Just took way too long to get our orders. A few people in our party got dessert. which took even longer! Not sure what the hold up was… but some other patrons sat down after us and still left before us. We were a bit frustrated with our first maid café experience. I left disappointed. The girls were friendly and polite, but waiting so long for our food ruined it.

Solid choice for a maid café outing. I won’t go into detail on how the whole thing works — there’s just too much to cover and I already wrote a blog entry on it so I’m fatigued.
With plenty of competition in Akihabara, @home seems to be doing quite well, they occupy several floors of the building. I don’t know the difference between the floors so I just went with the highest one — 7/​F baby!
My coffee was good, the ladies were friendly/​adorable, and my Polaroid turned out fantastic. What more could you possibly ask for during your one hour of weird?!

I would have given this establishment 4 stars if it weren’t for the extremely long wait for our food.
We went on a busy day and there was a mix up with our orders so only half of our table was served after our one-​hour time slot had expired. Thankfully, we had a Japanese friend who explained our situation to our maid, so we weren’t charged for the second hour.
It was quite frustrating though since two of our omurices did not come at all, while the table behind us had been served even though they ordered after us! We spoke with four different maids before one finally explained to us that they had missed half of our orders. We ended up staying at the café for way too long (nearly two hours) and by the time the two omurices came, everybody else was already finished.
Anyways, the the café itself was quite nice and around 30% of the maids were very cute. We ended up taking polaroid photos with them and doing the typical «magical» chants to make our drinks and food taste better. The drinks were pretty good but the food was honestly quite bland and barely any better than convenience store meals. This is definitely and experience that you want to try, but probably never do again. We came for the novelty and once is definitely enough!

Otaku dream
Hmm… Akihabara itself is a little strange place to me, but all the Maid Cafes are like a instant teleport to a super-​weird-​zone… but in a good sense ;)
This is not exactly a café but more like a show with maids involved ;). The moment you enter the place you’re being welcome with a choir of maids and for a short time you become their Goshujin-​sama (which can be roughly translated to Master). And as a master now, you can order anything from the menu, coffee for example ;)
This show lasts about an hour and if one wishes he or she can take a photo with one of the maids… on a stage… wearing a funny «hat» :) Otherwise taking pictures (and any other kinky exercises one may think of) is strictly forbidden.
The Maid Cafes were created for the «otaku» — the Japanese version of western term «geek». But Japanese geek is quite different. Akihabara is like a otaku mecca and maid cafes are probably what otaku heaven looks like ;)

When in Tokyo, you gotta experience a maid café, right? I came into this without much knowledge of what was supposed to happen, but I was with a friend who was excited about it, so why not. She’s been to Japan before and didn’t get the chance to go to one, so it was bound to happen on this trip!
Since we decided to see Akihabara and didn’t have many plans other than shopping, we stopped into Don Quijote, which is just a few floors below this maid café. At the top floor is where Home Café sits on. The line was relatively short, about a 15 minute wait, so we looked at the menu to decide what to order.
There’s a ¥600 entrance fee on top of whatever you order. We both decided to get a drink set, which includes a drink of choice and a picture with your maid of choice. We both got a matcha latte and a maid will come by and ask if you would like anything drawn on it. Lucy got alpaca and mine was gudetama, but neither really looked like what it was supposed to look like.
As you get seated, the room greets you and because we were both girls, they greeted us as «princess» haha. Well, that’s a little overwhelming. We got seated in the middle facing the stage and a maid comes over to take your order.
They go through the menu and when it’s time to decide your maid, they bring out this corkboard with each maid’s picture and you choose, lol! It was a weird feeling! Lucy decided to take a picture with our hostess since it was her birthday that day, which explains why she was a different colored outfit from the rest. Out of awkwardness, I just chose a random one. They ask how to pronounce your name and since there’s really no direct translation/​pronunciation for «Jamie», I was fine with however they pronounced it.
What took me off guard is that they announce your name to the audience and bring you on stage to take your picture with a polaroid. So, my maid Yoshino says, «Thank you for waiting, Princess ‘Jahh-​meeee’» HAHAHAHA
They have a few props to take a picture with and I chose cat ears (so typical, whatever!). She had very limited English, but she was really sweet and adorable! After they take your picture, it takes time to develop the print and then they take the time to deco your pic «moeeee» lol.
I thoroughly enjoyed people watching since you can tell who the regulars are and how devoted or fanboy they are to their favorite maids. One guy magnified one of the pictures of the maid and made it his phone case cover! If you don’t speak Japanese, the language barrier will affect your experience. The extent of our conversation was «where are you from?», «oh, america!», «I like big burgers» and «very good». And then they just walk away. Overall, the experience was interesting.

After reading a lot of the 会長はメイド様 manga back in the day, I’ve always been partial to the French maid costume. Not to be confused with a scandalous maid outfit (thanks Halloween, but no more resurrections of said costume for me!), the Japanese are really into the cutesy lolita French maid style. Cute/​colorful pastel dresses, long curly hair and large doe eyes, these girls are the epitome of kawaii.
Cuteness aside, what the heck at a 2 hour dining experience just for drinks and simple meals?! The matcha green tea latte was very tasty, with a super cute cap drawing. I ordered the omelette with rice and salad, and it tasted average like you’d expect at a cafeteria (a very cute one). Depending on which dining package you choose, you may or may not get to take a photo with them. Keep in mind that the packages can be very expensive and everyone has to get the same set. We got the drink and entrée option, which somehow ended up being about 8000円 for three of us. Yep, almost $ 27 USD per person based on the exchange rate at the time, but at the least I lived it!
Would I go again? No, because of the length of time it takes and the food isn’t anything «authentic» for Japan. Since service is slow, it may take a while before a maid comes by and realizes you haven’t ordered yet. They gave us the bill before anyone got their food. If you’re not going to be in Japan for more than a few days, do not waste your time here because it’s a tourist trap… But if you have three hours to kill and are willing to pay for the experience, then definitely try it out so that you can check it off your bucket list. Moe moe kyun~

I went in with a general idea of what a Maid Café is supposed to be like. For those uninitiated, on the @Home café website there’s a manga that you can read that’ll introduce you to what a maid café is supposed to be. When we got there there was a line of people waiting to get in. We chose to go to @Home because supposedly it was a good Maid Café for non-​Japanese speakers. This is partially true, while they’ll talk to you in English and you can order in English and what not, not knowing Japanese definitely hurts your experience.
The idea of the maid café is that you’re supposed to feel like you get attention from your maid and it’s supposed to make you feel warm and fuzzy inside. Unfortunately, since their English ability isn’t great, I imagine they want to spend as little time as possible speaking English and so our maid didn’t hang around at our table much more than she needed to. This seemed to be the case with all the other tables that had foreigners at them. Those who could speak Japanese seemed to get more attention which is more in line with what you’d expect of a maid café.
It was definitely an interesting experience but not really something I’d do again unless I somehow become fluent in Japanese and even then it’s not really something that I imagine would be too interesting to do again. Though I guess there are people who go all the time, I saw a guy with a whole book of pictures he had taken there.
Food wasn’t anything too special. Over priced for sure, but you’re paying for the experience. The «sets» definitely give you better value than if you order things individually.

«Welcome home, master!» greets the maids as you enter @home maid café on the 5^th floor of the Don Quijote building in Akihabara. Or if you’re a female like myself, «Welcome home, my lady!»
…SWOON.
In any case, we were looking to have an authentic «maid café» experience in Japan, and after some research, thought @home café would be a good choice since they have English-​speaking maids. This held true, but keep in mind they’re also not fluent and may interact more with their Japanese-​speaking customers.
Besides the ¥600 admission fee (for 1 hour), you can either order food/​drinks separately or as a set. The various sets are more cost-​effective considering the individual prices and especially since you can choose any drink/​dessert/​food that you want, so go for the more expensive items! My dessert set was ¥1400 and came with a drink, dessert, and polaroid snapshot. Not the cheapest lunch ever, but we were there for the experience, and an experience we received indeed!
I was afraid that the food would be small and low quality since the focus is on the maids, but thankfully it exceeded my expectations. I ordered the Princess A La Mode and Magic Sketch Iced Green Tea Latte. and both were ABSOLUTELY ADORABLE. For the «magic sketch» drink items, a maid will bring your drink and ask what you’d like to be drawn in the foam — personalized on-​the-​spot latte art?! YES! My Princess A La Mode was essentially a pudding on top of whipped cream and fruit cocktail with a giant chocolate heart that said «Princess» on it… nothing too complex but very cute and surprisingly filling!
The best part about the whole experience was hands-​down the maid interaction. Each time they would bring food or drinks to our table, we would have to perform a sort of spell/​chant together (complete with hand gestures) to «make our food taste yummier»! It makes everything more fun and you can’t help but giggle. If you order a set that includes a polaroid, you get called onstage to take a picture with the maid of your choice (no pressure…) while wearing a pair of animal ears. It makes a great souvenir since other photos of the maids and inside of the café (besides food) aren’t allowed!
Overall, the maid café is exactly as it sounds like — a very real café run purely by cute and young but professional girls dressed as maids. And these girls are PROS are what they do — deliberate or not, every single thing they said or did was high-​pitched and adorable. While definitely a novelty (and expensive) experience, it was worth trying, and now I have a membership card, soooo…

This place is mega kawaii! I’ve also been to maidreamin’ and I prefer @home than they.
There will be a line no matter what day and time you go, but the wait isn’t too ridiculous and I daresay it’s worth it for any first timers.
No photos are allowed to be taken of the maids, only the food you get served. But you can pay for a food package that includes a souvenir Polaroid photo with any maid of your choice that’s there.
The maids are super cute and really amp up on their high pitched animé voices. Yes they will refer to you as master or princess depending on gender. They’re really sweet! Event On my way! You get served your drink or food you have to do some «ritual spell» where you put on your baby voice and say some cute Japanese words to «activists your food». This place is definitely quite an experience!
Don’t be surprised of some creeps that dine there either — it’s completely normal! Haha

I had high expectations going into my first maid café, supposedly where it all started. @Home Café is now a large chain with multiple branches in Akihabara. This was their 10^th anniversary — can’t believe this concept has been around that long!
The whole experience felt a bit commercialized and it all felt very planned out rather than spontaneous and fun. Our waitress also kept switching to different girls, so we never got to bond with any one of the maids and really feel like we had a servant. The maids were all super cute though and all very well trained to have their mannerisms perfected. Ironically, the maids often provided instructions to their customers about what to do, and sometimes I wasn’t sure if the customers were the master or the servant!
I ordered a matcha latte, on which the maid drew a cute little picture. I got to choose a panda, dog, cat, or one other (don’t remember). I chose a panda, but her drawing didn’t look like a panda at all… My friend got a drawing of a cat on her coffee drink, but the color faded very quickly on the foam.
The experience was not cheap at 600 yen entrance fee and around 5 – 600 yen per drink. If you wanted a photo, it was another 500 yen. If it’s your birthday though, you get a free photo with all the girls ;)
We walked away with a couple of thoughtful souvenirs such as a pair of wooden chopsticks with our home country flag printed on the chopstick sleeve. We also got «membership cards» with bronze status… what a way to get customers hooked!