Ippuku

Finally managed to get a reservation on a quiet weeknight. We tried a variety of the dishes and none disappointed. Karage chicken, was great, whatever it was with pork belly was so good we had to order another one, the chef’s choice yakitori was perfect, onigiri, reminded me of my mom’s… It was a great meal and we ended w. the peanut butter mochi and green tea ice cream which were both amazing. I was with a colleague who wasn’t familiar with Izakaya style so I had to tell him «trust me» and when we finished he said he was glad he did. Can’t wait to go again and see what’s new on the menu and try some other dishes.

I really wanted to like this place as a Berkeley alternative to the izakayas in Tokyo or Vancouver but… The reductionist in you may argue that the place is quite charming, the service is very good, all the ingredients are fresh. But don’t be surprised if the sum isn’t as good as the parts. We tried pretty much everything in the menu and were so disappointed that we ended up not eating much of some of the potential highlights — such as the scallops. The chefs needs to cater to more izakaya accustomed clientele as once the novelty is gone so will be the customers.

I’ll still give this place 3 stars even though I got food poisoning from their rare chicken yakitori. It’s partly my fault for ordering raw chicken. I assumed since they serve rare chicken, its probably of the highest quality. My bad. Other than that it’s a pretty legit joint.

Been here at least half of dozen times and it never disappointed! Finding this restaurant is kinda hard because it doesn’t really have much signage. They serve fusion-​y izakaya food, which means a lot of skewers! However, my favorite here is actually their sesame ice cream. But the quantity is limited, so there were definitely a couple of times when I tried ordering it but was told that they were sold out. A couple of things to beware: if you don’t have a reservation, walk-​in wait can take hours (yes, hourS). Also, their price is on the higher end compare to other izakaya places (such as Yakitori Kokko in San Mateo), but I think their quality definitely makes up for it.

Fantastic. This is a small plates restaurant — kind of like Japanese tapas. Don’t expect sushi here. Chicken is their specialty, but everything we had was delicious. I especially liked the ramen, and their chicken — rice porridge.

Amazing meal. Expensive, but you get what you pay for. Love the subtle décor and privacy of the booths, you’re not at tables crammed together with conversation you don’t give a shit about.
Some of the best dishes for us were: — uni incredibly fresh and lush
— ground grilled chicken with egg yolk, ’nuff said.
and
— chicken tartare, don’t be scared you’re missing out if you don’t have this, it’s amazingly good
All the yakitori was very tasty with great flavor and charring from the charcoal, the bacon wrapped mochi really highlighted the smokiness. Crab croquettes had a crisp exterior and super creamy, crabby center. We had reservations for 8:00pm, so we missed out on a few of the chicken parts. We’ll get there earlier next time.
Squid ink fried rice was good, but I wanted more of that squid ink flavor, it just tasted like a plain fried rice. It was good, but I think I’ll pass next time.
The green tea gelato was fine, but didn’t pack the punch of the rest of the meal. A little pedestrian in my opinion.

This place is deceptively expensive. They charge $ 7 per meal regardless of what you order. We ordered two tiny bowls of food and ended up paying around $ 35. The food was only mediocre, as well — nothing worth the outrageous price.

This deserves all the hype, all the stars, and the long lines and wait times… everything. The space is super cool, the music is great, the service is efficient, the sake/​Japanese whiskey selections are A+…and the food is IN-​CREDIBLE. We actually ate dinner here two days in a row, it was THAT awesome!
The first night, we arrived around 6:30 — 7:00 and put our name down for a table. The wait ended up being about an hour. We hung by the bar, drank sake, and ate some of the best fried chicken of my life. It’s boneless, which makes the eating all that more pleasant. It was a fun little spot to chill out — they play basically nonstop David Bowie (throughout the restaurant) and they have a little disco ball and outdoor stools that overlook the bar, which gave it a pretty legit, yakitori vibe.
For dinner our first night, in addition to our fried chicken appetizer, we had a few grilled chicken skewers, the squid, and the pork belly. The skewers were all so fresh and nicely charred. The squid was terrific — perfectly cooked and not at all chewy, plus it was served with num-​yummy Kewpie mayo. The pork belly was also, woah. As a finale, we had the tori udon, which is truly one of the best chicken soups of my life. The broth is just mind-​blowingly good.
The next day, I was craving the soup so badly that we had to go back for dinner. This time, we arrived at 4:59pm…and there was already a line of, like, 10 people. We were seated in about 20 minutes after they got through seating some people with reservations and the people in front of us. We snagged the last two spots at the grill table — woo hoo.
For dinner the second night, we did chicken breast and thigh skewers — the thigh being much tastier — as well as the ground chicken skewer served with the poached egg yolk. That was amazeballs. In addition, we got a king oyster mushroom skewer… I probably wouldn’t do that again; little flavor and super chewy. We also had another tori udon and an order of the squid ink fried rice. The latter was OK and definitely cool to watch them prepare, but I had to add a lot of the seasoned salt to enjoy it. I wanted to get more fried chicken, but I felt bad still from pigging out the night before…
Pro tip — try to sit at the grill table — it’s fun being so close to the action, and we ended up getting a lot of ideas for things to order by watching them prepare other dishes.
I can’t wait to come back here and bring pretty much everyone I know.

I’ve been here at least 5 times but each time it was with someone else paying. I think that’s the trick to really enjoying this place since it gets heelllaa expensive.
Here’s what you NEED to order:
— Thigh oyster skewers (juiciest piece of chicken meat wrapped in crispy skin, yum)
— Black squid ink fried rice (my sister could eat the whole thing by herself)
— Skin skewers (obviously, it’s just delicious)
— Asahi draft beer (they have a machine that makes the perfect foam top, plus yakiniku and beer are a match made in heaven)
Here’s what’s ALSO GOOD:
— Sunagimo skewer (I don’t even know what this in English – gizzard? Chewy and good)
— Agedashi tofu (had it last time and if you like ponzu you’ll like this!)
— Bacon wrapped mochi (my mom loves this one)
Here’s what to AVOID:
— Paying for the meal yourself
Plus the bartenders are super nice so give standing up at the bar and eating while chatting with them a try if there are no spots at the tables!
PS. Took off one star because of the price and also sometimes the skewers get a bit repetitive testing – they don’t ask you if you want shio or tare (salt or sauce) like some other yakitori/​izakaya places do. Maybe I’ll try asking next time.

Traditional Japanese style pub and grill! The pub has awesome atmosphere, it makes you feel like dining in Japan. I ordered the mix chicken grill and they are really amazing! The meat with their special grill sauce is very tasty. And their vegetables are also good choices. Although I didn’t try the seafood, they must be very nice, I see their squid, looks delicious. They have all kinds of Japanese sakes and beer. Though expensive, it is the best Japanese pub and grill in Berkeley!

Probably the most over hyped place I’ve been to. The food was pretty much the same that I’ve had at any Japanese BBQ restaurant, but with much higher prices and maybe a little less of quality.
There are hordes of followers who post reviews based on the ones written by others for the same place. That’s not cool. My experience was nice at this place. It is right in downtown Berkeley and if you have the money, it is good to experience something like this at least once. But to be honest, if you try this place and then go to; say South Bay and have similar experience at almost half the price, you’ll have second thoughts about this place.
Service wasn’t as attentive as I was expecting. Their bathrooms are clean, which is a good thing given how busy this place gets. The food was delicious and if you go in s group, be prepared to have reservations. They will not seat you based on your money. Fairness prevails here and that’s always a good thing.
Enjoy good food in good company.
Life. What’s not to love about it?!

Good yakitori? Well, it’s decent. Pricey? Damn well it was.
The décor is very well-​maintained and has nice traditional Japanese styling. It is, of course, quite a bit more spacey than the places in Tokyo I’ve been to ;)
We got just about all the non-​organ grilled items from the menu. This is the first place I’ve seen chicken oysters — I didn’t even know such a delicious cut exists! It’s really, really tender meat that is both juicy and flavourful. I highly recommend getting that, if anything. They also have whole roasted squabs (or quails? I forget), which is always fun to eat, if you don’t mind it being a bit gamey. Otherwise, I would just suggest getting the kind of chicken cuts that you like, as there is quite a selection here.
Overall, I didn’t find their yakitori to be better than some of the good places around the bay area, except that they have chicken oysters. In fact, some of the skewers was even underwhelming or overly tough. It can also end up being quite expensive, as you can always eat more meat than you think.

Mehhh
Love the décor and vibes.
Service was kinda sorta not that great. Seated immediately but then left in the dust. No one came to check up and/​or take our order or anything until we proactively attempted to wave them down.
Food was okay. The tsuketama and squid ink fried rice was pretty good. The other dishes were decent. They did not have the torisasha or yukke so we were a bit disappointed. Also no uni or cartilage either tonight. The cheese thing was okay. Gyoza was pretty good. Gyutan was above average. Udon was prettty good (tasty). Only thing was that there was not one dish here that wow’d me. Disappointed indeed.
Overall it was okay. I give them 4.5 stars for the décor, 2 stars for service, 3 stars for food, 2.5 stars for drink/​price selection… so 3 stars overall (between mediocre & about above average status)
I really like the vibe & décor so id recommend you check them out if you’re nearby. Food is meh but some dishes might impress. Overhyped. Nothing was impressive… Just ok, good to pretty good. Will come back to try the tori but expecting it’ll be nothing to special now.

We went there yesterday again because we wanted to have some Japanese style grilled food. The waiting still took over half an hour. While we were waiting, we decided to order some food and eat at the bar. One of the server at the bar was very rude (mid-​aged guy), I asked him if they had matcha tiramisu (pictures on Unilocal shows they used to serve it), he said (with some attitude): «we only have food that’s on our menu, if you don’t see it here then we don’t have it. Pictures you found in Unilocal do not related to us!» Okay, calm down, it’s not my fault not knowing you don’t like Unilocal,and well you could simply told me that you don’t have it.
Their overall service haven’t improved very much from the last time I came here. The food was still pretty slow. Every server were busy, they all looked like they were rush into something. We felt as guests we needed to catch them and tell them everything we wanted all at once, otherwise we’ll need to wait for another 10 minute to catch them again.
The food was very good yesterday, I don’t have anything to complain about it. The sweet potato and the chicken liver were my favorite from yesterday.
Only the service, obviously they did’t have enough server, also their kitchen needed to be improved to support orders timely.

Ippuku is that rent boy you wound up with: boozy, exotic, and fun even if he picked your wallet clean and left you wanting more. Four of us dined here on a Monday night dropping $ 250 and leaving liquored up and hungry again within the hour.
Ippuku is a traditional izakaya with groovy private booths that require you to take off your shoes and climb a platform in order to sit down. The waitress does the same, settling on a pillow at your table as she repeatedly takes your orders and tries to explain that menu. It’s a doozy.
The multi-​page menu is a bit overwhelming and once the sake hits all bets are off. The waitress recommended we order one or two items per page which is probably what we did but 4 — 6 items per page wouldn’t have been unwelcome. The menu is large, the portions are small. Splitting plates amongst 4 people was comical.
Monday and Tuesday are supposed to be Teuchi Soba nights where focus is on handmade noodles and only a limited yakitori menu is offered. On this Monday night though, an emergency had prevented the noodle prep so the full menu was offered.
Without regaling you with details of everything I ate, suffice to say that all was good but I’d have been game for more «all». I’d really enjoy going whole hog on that menu, damn the final expense. This is pretty much the approach Michael Bauer (SF Chronicle Restaurant Critic) took when he reviewed the place in 2010 and if you can afford it I’d recommend you take the same approach.
In addition to the many little goodie-​filled plates much sake was consumed as well as a shot of their cheapest soju which our waitress dubbed «student soju». Parents, if your students are at Ippuku you’re clearly giving them too much allowance. Word.
Ippuku has gone all in on the «all in» concept with a standing tip of $ 7 per person automatically added in. Tax has been added into the prices you see on the menu. This can make your bill somewhat of a shocker until you remember that no further tip is needed. Forget that and you’ll be smacking your head in the a.m.
I’d love to return to Ippuku on someone else’s dime. For my money though, I’ll probably head somewhere else where a solid financial investment yields me a hearty plateful of vittles.

Such a fun spot for an intimate party of friends (there were 9 of us, and we pretty much took the biggest sized seating area) with AMAZING food.
Came out to roughly $ 40/​person including tax and tip — and this included corkage and cake fee since we brought our own sake and birthday cake. Totally reasonable considering we ordered half the menu
Must tries:
— squid ink fried rice
— all the grilled items (yakitori) — seriously! Especially chicken cartilage and chicken neck!
— ramen
— thin sliced steak
— crab croquettes
I could stay at this place for hours! Authentic atmosphere and food, extremely friendly staff! Wish they stayed open later!

Ippuku is a cute Japanese izakaya located in the heart of downtown Berkeley. It’s almost impossible to find parking in this area but if you can pay for parking the Bank of America parking lot. There’s also a parking garage on Center and Milvia that’s relatively affordable.
The robata grill kitchen and tatami mat seating makes it feel really authentic. Overall, the atmosphere feels intimate and it seems like a great date spot. Personally, I like coming here with a small group so that we can share more dishes.
I recommend the fried corn fritter, omakase grill platter, bacon wrapped mochi, and the grilled whole squid. I would skip the squid ink fried rice.
–1 star for the steep prices and the $ 6 per person service charge.

Came here just tonight under the recommendation of my friends. It’s a very traditional restaurant with quite a selection of skewers. They’re mostly famous for their chicken.
Food: ⁴⁄₅
The food here was overall pretty decent, with some disappointing dishes. The chicken skewers were pretty tasty, with the slight scent of the charcoal grill which I loved, but a little dry and tough in my opinion. We ordered the shoulder blades and the knee cartilages. The mochi was flavourful, but would have tasted better if they seasoned it nicer. Karaage was moist and juicy, but some of the pieces were a little tough, so I suppose it was a little inconsistent. Overall the food is pretty decent for the price you get.
Service: ⁵⁄₅
Service was quite good. The staff all speak japanese, so it is quite authentic. Their english is not a problem however, and our waitress was very cheerful and enthusiastic in taking our orders and refilling our drinks. It was quite busy on an early Tuesday night, but they still managed to balance out service between tables.

The great:
Sake — So many choices but the servers are able to describe them if you look like a deer in headlights like I did.
Bacon wrapped mochi — Best thing on the menu. The crispy, saltiness of the bacon matched so well with the plain, soft texture of the mochi. Yum.
Crab croquettes — We didn’t want it to end! Packed with crab… perfectly fried.
The good:
Whole squid
Corn fritters — great texture
Chicken thigh — so moist
Grilled pork belly — pork belly is delicious any way you get it. Therefore, you must order both types they offer!
Braised pork belly — great marinade, cooked well, super tender
Soba — great texture of the noodles, homemade, only available Monday and Tuesday
The bad:
Eggplant — terribly bland and overlooked. I don’t recommend it.
The prices — each item ranged from $ 6.00−20.00. 2 sticks with each order for the most part.
Overall, the experience was fantastic. Service was great. The ambiance was hip. Street parking only.

This place is worth hitting up for japanese beers and yakitori. They have simple yet solid food menu. We didn’t have reservations so we ended up waiting for more than an hour to get a table. And man were we starving!
Ordered bacon wrapped mochi, squid ink fried rice, chicken yakitori, quail eggs, and chicken karaage.
Yakitori is grilled to perfection! Chicken Karaage is crispy and juicy and it’s probably the best I’ve had. The squid ink fried rice is really good! Everything was delicious!
The only thing I don’t like about the place is that they don’t allow you to take pictures inside. We took a few photos and were told that we should not be taking pictures =(#busted
So if you’re looking for an izakaya restaurant in the Bay Area (and don’t mind not being able to take photos of your food), then check out Ippuku!