Yamato Japanese Restaurant

For the prices on the menu this place in NOT CLEAN! Most importantly they lack the understanding of common customer service. The are pushy, in your face, and basically treat you like crap. Planning a dinner with friends sitting at the bar, a group of drunks come in, I am basically told to get up and moved with having the decision to give up my seat. They picked up my things and moved them to another spot. I was treated like a second class citizen, I didn’t not eat, they ruined my appetite, thank god cause I noticed how dirty the place is. I also had another friend coming. The owners wife or the female manager kept bumping up after telling her I was no loner eating, she put my friends bill I front of me to pay. Do not waist your money here at all, there are a lot more restaurants that will treat you like a customer should. I think the owners are more into money and have lost the realty on how to treat people with respect and class. I will never eat there again nor will I recommend it to anyone! Another thing s restaurant shares its building with an animal clinic! HORRIBLE HORRIBLE HORRIBLE

I absolutely love this restaurant! Their lunch specials are amazing and the sushi is the best. I like ambiance and seating a lot better than Sky Bar. Also i think the specials are better. 5 stars!

Arguably the best sashimi and sushi I’ve had in the U.S. Always incredibly fresh and beautifully presented, and every roll I’ve tried was outstanding and creatively done. Because I always go for their exceptional sushi, I don’t order hibachi. But I tried my friend’s steak and shrimp, and it was really juicy and full of flavor. I can’t imagine that there’s a better restaurant on the island. The service is great, too, and they’re happy to make recommendations based on your preferences or what’s best fresh that day.

We ALWAYS love eating sushi here at Yamato’s! I’ve been coming here now with my girlfriend (now fiancé) for some time! Always a Grand experience! Sushi is Always superb & the staff is friendly!!!
What you pay for and what you get, you definitely leave WINNING!!!
A+++

Habachi chef were good. Everyone liked the food. Do not come here for the sushi. It’s overpriced and very small portions. The services was horrible. Everyone had their food before myself and did not get until I complained to the manager.

We loved this place! My son had udon and said it was awesome. Hibachi table experience was fun. Scallops were superb. Fried rice needed egg. We will definitely go back.

Friday night happy hour. They started getting busy around 6:30. We sat in the bar area and really enjoyed it. The sashimi white fish was actually escolar and not albacore. It was buttery smooth. The sashimi fresh salmon was perfect. We also had the tiger eye roll and the rock n roll. They were both prepared just right. The oyster roll was served in a stand and wrapped in nori. The oysters were large and fried lightly golden.
It was a great meal. The place started to get a bit loud with the people at the hibachi tables laughing and yelling out. But that is to be expected on a weekend night. We will definitely come back.

The only worth wild good sushi on the island. Friendly staff delicious choices good booze. What can I say I love going here.

Overall, a wonderful experience at this restaurant. The seating was limited, but we were seated quickly since we weren’t having any hibachi. The inside was clean and the staff were friendly and tentative (they came by often to remove empty plates and refill drinks).
The food was amazing. My husband and I got the futo maki, the dragon roll, the Texas roll, the Rock and Roll Special, the jalapeño poppers and the agedashi tofu. It was ALL very good, but we highly recommend the Rock and Roll Special. We’d definitely go back, especially since it was super affordable. We got all of our food for less than $ 55.00.

We had the dozen peel and eat shrimp each. Very good flavor and nice size too. I also had the mixed grilled vegetables. Great flavor as well. A little pricy though for the size.

My husband and I stopped for lunch and ordered tempura shrimp and teriyaki steak. The food was very fresh and tasty and came with soup or salad and two sides. I ordered a salad, California roll and spring roll to go with my meal. The salad was very fresh and I loved the flavorful ginger dressing on top. Equally good was the shrimp spring roll and California roll. My husband had onion soup, fried mashed potatoes and California roll to go with his meal. The shrimp tempura was made with huge shrimp and very tasty and crisp. (Not greasy at all). He also enjoyed his soup and sides. We enjoyed our lunch and will return soon…

My nephew was accepted to UTMB.
We were all happy to go for a Japanese Dinner. The Hibachi was too salty.
Sushi was not that great ether. It’s kinda frozen food taste to me.
Even-​though the staff was very nice and friendly, we won’t be back.

They have an excellent selection of wine. The chef’s that work the Hibachi Grill’s definitely know how to entertain. The Sushi selection is AWESOME!

Very fresh, melt-​in-​your-​mouth sushi! They sell nigiri in orders of 2 pieces. My fiancée and I got stuffed for only $ 40, which is reasonable for everything a la carte! Very happy with this place, will be back!

Glorious!!! I had «White Dragon» sushi (mahi mahi and white tuna). Wife had spicy salmon sushi. The sushi was phenomenal!
We also shared a «frita tuna» roll. It was crispy but not greasy. Fantastic experience!

Great Sushi place with lot of options. I am not a sushi guy and I dislike sushi for most part of it. This place rocks. Of course, I only tried a few items and completely against raw food. All the ones I tried are cooked. Rock n Roll, Tuna Frito, Smoked Salmon. I really like the Rock N Roll. Even the side order of egg fried rice with extra eggs was really flavorful.
Please don’t park under the huge billboard, if you like your car not to have lot of bird poop before you finish your meal.

Not the best hibachi but not bad either. They have some good points and some not so good points.
The good:
Great miso soup
Nice size shrimp
Good service
Decent sushi
Good lunch specials
Great To Go service
The bad:
Salad dressing is terrible
Portions of meat and veggies are smaller than other places
They don’t serve shrimp appetizer like other places
Also their prices are a bit higher for portion.
No chicken in the fried rice
Décor and feel inside is blah
It’s not bad but it’s not great but it’s a good option compared to other choices on the island and overall the quality is not bad

I came into the restaurant thinking it would be cheap, good sushi. However, I was wrong. It wasn’t as cheap as I was hoping. Since I’m balling on a budget, I only ordered 1 order of salmon sashimi, 1 order of tuna sashimi, 1 spicy chopped scallop hand roll, and 1 order of edamame. The edamame was good, but can you really mess up edamame? It did not come with any salt on it, but I appreciated this, since you can control the amount of salt that you want on it.
The sashimi comes with 4 pieces, but they are very thinly sliced. The fish tasted fresh and practically melted in your mouth. The spicy chopped scallop handroll wasn’t as full or big as I had wanted for almost $ 5, but it was still tasty. My order came out to be close to $ 20 including time, but I was definitely nowhere near satisfied or full. The sushi definitely tastes good, just wish I had more money to blow!

I loved it here! My friend recommended this small little sushi place for when we made a day trip to Galveston, & I’m glad he did.
I didn’t order much, but everyone at my table was seemingly satisfied with their orders (taste-​wise, not price/​full-​wise).
Firecracker roll (⁵⁄₅) Very fresh but not filling. If you’re very hungry, one order won’t do it for you.
I’d definitely give it a five star rating if the portions weren’t so small.
Wait time for food: ~15 minutes after ordering.

Being the only Japanese restaurant on the Island, I was a little skeptical about giving this place a try, but a friend of mine and fellow foodie recommended it to me as some of the best sushi he had ever had.
The best time to go for a good value on sushi is for lunch. There are several sushi, sashimi, and handroll combinations to choose from as well as yakisoba, udon, and a variety of bento boxes. You get two sides of your choice for the bento boxes. There’s a lot of specialty sushi choices if that is your fancy. Hibachi is not available for lunch, but I am sure it is good entertainment for the evening. Yamoto does offer a nice selection of wines and Japanese beer, so be sure to pick something to compliment your delicious meal.
My dining companion and I opted for the Rock and Roll and eight piece sushi combination as well as a California roll, spicy tuna roll, and Rock and Roll Handroll combination for $ 12.95 each. You get the choice of a soup or salad with these. We also added a spicy scallop handroll, two pieces of bluefin tuna sushi, and a bottle of house hot sake.
I started with the onion soup, and my dining companion selected the miso. They were both very nice! I’m not usually a huge fan of miso, but theirs was very pleasant and well balanced. The onion soup which is a light broth with thin sliced mushrooms swimming in it was also very simple, clean and tasty. It was a great refreshing start to the meal.
As for the sushi plates, wow, beautiful presentation! The rolls were cut nicely and evenly, the rolls were wrapped tightly and perfectly with sticky short grained rice, and the sushi had a great ratio of rice to fish. The little garnishes and attention to detail really made a difference. Most of the sushi was exquisitely fresh and eating it was almost a spiritual sensation. All you can do is chew and nod your head with a word or two of approval. The white fishes and the spicy scallop handroll were especially divine.
However, as for the downfall, the tuna was not fresh at all. The regular tuna on the sushi combo we had had that notable not too fresh fishy taste. Sadly the bluefin tuna had a bit of fishiness to it which at $ 7 for two pieces, was a huge disappointment.
Service was okay, as there was only one server, and she was helped by what appeared to be a manager at times. I asked her before ordering the bluefin tuna if it was fresh, and she assured me it was. Lies!
All in all, great experience. There were some items on the menu that were not authentic Japanese items, which does not surprise me since I am guessing this place is Chinese owned as the Asians on staff spoke Chinese. The big kicker was the bowl of fortune cookies at the register. You do NOT get fortune cookies and a Japanese restaurant. Ah well, at least they were the tasty kind.
Will definitely return on a future visit to the island!