Top Japanese Restaurants in the Bay Area

Bustling setting for happy hour sake specials and ramen.

Open since 2008 and now settled in a new location, stylish Amakara is one of the trendiest watering holes in downtown Dublin. On weekends, people flock to the restaurant for creative sushi rolls, ramen and its full roster of cocktails. The 5,000-square-foot, 188-seat space is sleek but informal, with its cool sumo wrestler mural, custom granite and wood counters and comfortable, slouchy dining chairs. Owners Jackie and Eddy Imano have put together a menu of cocktail-friendly small bites, like the grilled and smoky edamame ($8) and spicy oyster shooters ($11) with quail eggs and some bracing cold sake. One highlight among the entrees is the clam ramen ($19.50), in which Manila clams swim in a butter-enriched broth.

Credit cards accepted • Full bar

925-803-8485 • www.eatamakara.com • Order online

A 115-year-old mochi shop that’s a cornerstone of Japantown.

While the third-generation owners of San Francisco’s legendary mochi shop plan to retire at the end of the year, there’s still time to enjoy their handmade confections. Opened by Suyeichi Okamura in 1906, the shop has always been an integral part of the city’s historical Japanese neighborhood. Each day, current owners Ricky and Bobby Okamura make more than 1,000 individual manju and mochi that are quickly snapped up for holidays, gifts and celebrations. Mochi, made with glutinous rice flour, are wrapped around squishy fillings like lima bean paste and peanut butter. Look for seasonal varieties flavored with mango and blueberry.

Cash only

415-922-1244 • www.benkyodocompany.com

A family-owned restaurant offers homestyle noodle soups and sushi inspired by Japanese Buddhist cuisine.

In the 1990s, Atsushi Katsumata opened the first Cha-Ya on Berkeley's Shattuck Avenue — the neighborhood was a hotbed of the kind of produce-forward and seasonal cuisine that the vegan Japanese restaurant would serve. Propelled by its runaway popularity, he opened a second location in San Francisco in 2004. The cuisine here is rustic and homey: brothy, soy sauce-flavored soups with sticky lotus roots and glass noodles ($18.50); deep-fried tofu soaked in mushroom and seaweed dashi ($9.50); and sushi rolls with pickled, steamed and fried vegetable components that reveal new textures with every chew. Outdoor dining is available on the restaurant's sidewalk.

Credit cards accepted • Beer, wine and sake

415-252-7825 • www.chayasf.com/ • Order online

Japanese curry is served with fried chicken, potato croquettes and vegetables here.

With a background in fine dining, chef Masayuki Tadokoro could have opened a kaiseki restaurant in the Bay Area. Instead, he went populist with a restaurant that specializes in Japanese-style curry, priced from $11 to $14 a plate. That said, his curry takes a lot of work. It’s enriched by three-hour caramelized onions and 21 spices, resulting in a sauce that’s as rich for the senses as well-aged wine. While the restaurant opened with a curry-only menu shortly after the Bay Area’s first pandemic lockdown, it’s since introduced dishes like buttery corn soup ($4), comforting katsudon ($11), a rice bowl topped with crisp, panko-crusted meat, onions and runny simmered egg. The restaurant is open for indoor dining as well as takeout and delivery.

Credit cards accepted • Soft drinks

650-458-3071 • https://curryhyuga.com • Order online

The curry here is black, the color of your true love's hair.

A concept by East Bay restaurateur Chikara Ono, Dela Curo Curry zeroes in on black curry ($11), a labor-intensive variant of Japanese curry that originated in northwestern Japan. Ono’s version gets its flavor from a dark roux, caramelized onions and rich pieces of Washugyu beef, cooked together for hours. The result is a complex, coffee-like sauce tailor-made for draping over fried tonkatsu and creamy omelets. Ono pairs the curry with house-made napa cabbage pickles, crisp wisps of shredded cabbage and heaps of white rice. Now open in Oakland’s Swan’s Market, the counter-service restaurant has outdoor and indoor seating in the complex.

Credit cards accepted • Beer, wine and sake

www.delacuro.com • Order online

This izakaya serves satisfying Japanese hot pots and rice bowls.

Ambitious Fish and Bird Izakaya opened in early 2020 with a mission to show the Bay Area a new face of Japanese contemporary cuisine. The team of Yoshika Hedberg and former B-Dama chefs Asuka Uchida and Shin Okamoto focus on sousaku ryouri, otherwise known as New Japanese cuisine, which more closely reflects what one can find in restaurants in Japan's cities. In practice, that means dishes like anchovy nanban, where the fish are deep-fried whole and served in a vinegar-laced sauce, or a tempura of local sea beans and corn ($12). While the team didn't initially intend to serve sushi, they added sets of nigiri and maki ($39) and seasonal sashimi assortments ($39) by customer request. The izakaya offers outdoor and indoor seating.

Credit cards accepted • Full bar

510-705-1539 • https://fishbirdizakaya.com/ • Order online

Buzzy SoMa spot where the omakase includes lamb chops in addition to sushi.

At Hakashi, a low-key sushi bar in SoMa, chef Julio Zapata and his team crank out crowd-pleasing sushi rolls laden with spicy tuna, jalapeños and plenty of avocado; rice bowls that jiggle with softly cooked egg; and a stellar omakase (around 20 dishes for $160). The omakase isn’t just sushi: It includes whole petite freshwater crabs, fresh oysters served with jiggly quail egg yolks, herb-crusted lamb chops and decadent yuzu cheesecake. A major highlight of the restaurant is its attentive, personable service, which brings neighbors back night after night.

Credit cards accepted • Full bar

415-872-9589 • www.hakashisushi.com

Yakitori gets the omakase treatment at this ode to the humble chicken skewer.

Hina Yakitori’s counter in NoPa is open after a long hiatus, with a 13-course tasting menu ($139) featuring pasture-raised chicken grilled over imported Japanese coals. Led by chef Tommy Cleary, the team works at a brisk cadence to expertly grill, baste and garnish your skewers in a dance that’s fascinating to watch from the counter. Seemingly humble skewers are garnished with not-so-humble accoutrements, like Tsar Nicoulai caviar, finger lime pulp, cured jidori egg yolks and smoked fish shredded a la minute.

Credit cards accepted • Beer, wine and sake

415-817-1944 • www.hinasf.com

A low-lit yakitori spot with a prolific library of sake and shochu.

When school’s in session, Ippuku fills up with Cal students and staff who pile into the booths for highballs, gooey skewers of bacon-wrapped mochi and bone-in chicken karaage. Opened in 2009 by Christian Geideman, the restaurant errs on the side of tradition, serving the kinds of dishes you’d easily find on izakaya menus in Japan — even deep cuts like chicken sashimi. The cozy wooden interior makes the restaurant seem like something straight out of a Tokyo alleyway: the kind of place you spontaneously drop into while wandering the streets at midnight. That said, Ippuku’s popularity can make the waits long, so be sure to call ahead to reserve a spot.

Credit cards accepted • Full bar

510-665-1969 • https://ippukuberkeley.com/

Seasonal California ingredients and Japanese technique go hand in hand here.

A native of a northern Japanese region known for its harsh winters, Iyasare chef Shotaro Kamio is an expert on soul-warming comfort food. At his Berkeley restaurant, he ties the Tohoku region’s unfussy and satisfying culinary traditions with the ethos of California cuisine. Seasonal vegetables are basted with a tangy and aromatic black garlic tamari on the grill; Little Gem lettuces get dressed in a powerful, umami-packed miso Caesar dressing; and a miso habanero ramen warms you as quickly as an electric blanket. Open for indoor and heated outdoor seating.

Credit cards accepted • Full bar

510-845-8100 • www.iyasare-berkeley.com • Order online

Wash away the day at this homey izakaya in a strip mall.

Opened in a bustling Concord strip mall in 2019, Izakaya An is a low-key space that specializes in kobachi: small bites made for pairing with sake and other spirits. You could assemble a meal out of the little plates that populate the front of the menu, like delicate fried strips of earthy, parsnip-like burdock root ($6) served with a savory mentaiko dip, or go big with the various meal sets and bentos that feature heartier grilled meats and tempura dishes. Ago dashi, a light and refined flying fish stock, forms the base for many of the soup dishes here. The drinks are also made with great care: When you order a shochu sour, proprietor Mariko will come to your table and squeeze the citrus juice for your drink.

Credit cards accepted • Full bar

925-338-2852 • www.izakaya-an.com • Order online

Once a ramen shop, Kaiseki Saryo Hachi has transformed into one of the best showcases of Japanese haute cuisine in the Bay Area.

During the early days of the pandemic, ramen shop owner Yuko Nammo brought her husband, chef Shinichi Aoki, into the kitchen while the Michelin-starred restaurant he worked at reduced its hours. Both have backgrounds in traditional kaiseki-style cooking, the Japanese equivalent of haute cuisine, and their experience and comfort with the genre are in full view at the restaurant. The $200/person menu showcases a variety of techniques in its multicourse progression, including golden-eyed snapper simmered in soup with winter melon and makrut lime, tender barbecued eel with soft scrambled eggs, and seasonal dishes, like tomato gelee with fava beans.

Credit cards accepted • Wine and sake

650-885-1242 • https://ramensaryo.com/

This ramen shop's rich chicken paitan draws long lines.

After a long pandemic-driven hiatus, Tomoharu Shono’s famous Tenderloin ramen shop is now open again. Since 2016, the ramen shop has attracted crowds for its slurpable broths, including a labor-intensive cloudy chicken broth made from concentrated chicken bones and fat. The enoki mushroom-topped creamy vegan ramen, which gets umami from kombu, shiitake mushrooms and ground-up nuts, is also the city’s best plant-based ramen. The indoor-only restaurant doesn’t take reservations or pre-orders, so be prepared to wait and try not to bring too many friends.

Credit cards accepted • Beer and wine

415-800-8345 • http://mensho.tokyo/

Customizable and savory Japanese pancakes, or okonomiyaki, are made from scratch at this pop-up.

While Okkon used to make the rounds as a pop-up, the Kamimae family has stayed anchored to Oakland's eclectic O2 Artisans Aggregate courtyard, close to soba hot spot Soba Ichi. Now they show up every weekend, masked up and slinging their scratch-made, oval-shape okonomiyaki ($12), draft beer and organic gyoza ($8) for eating at the courtyard's new patio seating. Each dish can be customized to order with ingredients like spicy cod roe ($3), stretchy mochi ($2) and organic mushrooms ($2). Each okonomiyaki is made to order, its texture as fluffy as the best American pancakes. Though walk-ups are still OK, you can also preorder through Instagram messages to cut down on the wait.

Credit cards accepted • Beer

510-590-0482 • okkonpopup.wixsite.com/okonomiyaki

This elegant space hosts Japanese pub cuisine with an exciting California sensibility.

Rintaro's in-person dining program includes $75/person set menus, making it one of the best gourmet deals in San Francisco. It features owner Sylvan Mishima Brackett's Californian take on Japanese izakaya staples, like sashimi plates stacked with jewel-like pieces of locally caught fish and pickled wasabi leaves, smoky yakitori skewers and hand-rolled udon noodles made fresh every day. The enclosed, private courtyard is spacious and filled with plants, like the peppery sansho shrub, while the interior includes booths made from redwood wine casks and walls made of smoothed-down red clay.

Credit cards accepted • Beer, wine and sake

415-589-7022 • www.izakayarintaro.com

Handmade Japanese buckwheat noodles are served in a Zen temple-inspired setting.

The courtyard at Soba Ichi, located in the midst of Oakland's O2 Artisans Aggregate space, is popping, and chef Koichi Ishii is now offering an extremely pared-down menu for walk-ups: fresh soba noodles with a soy sauce-based dipping sauce ($16), delicate homemade tofu ($7) and cured mackerel sushi ($12). Noodles are made fresh every day from buckwheat flour that Ishii and his team grind themselves, making this shop one of the rare places where one can taste true artisan soba. Diners can slurp noodles down at wooden tables set with flat benches; there's a sloped roof to shelter them from the elements.

Credit cards accepted • Beer, wine and sake

510-465-1969 • www.sobaichioakland.com

An elegant, grill-centric pub in north Los Altos.

In the center of Sumika’s dining room is a glass-encased grill stocked with imported binchotan coals from Japan. Those coals are ideal for cooking the many skewers that the restaurant sells: juicy chicken breast finished with sour plum sauce, chewy chicken knees, squeaky enoki mushrooms wrapped in pork. A can’t-miss dish is the oyakodon ($14), a sweet-and-salty rice dish of smoky grilled chicken and runny egg. Kuniko and Gary Ozawa opened the izakaya in 2006 to give local Japanese Americans a place to mingle; since then, the couple have gone on to open three more restaurants, including ramen shop Orenchi, in the South Bay and Peninsula.

Credit cards accepted • Beer, wine and sake

650-917-1822 • www.sumikagrill.com • Order online

Don't miss the excellent bento meals at this popular supermarket.

Known for its exceptional selection of fresh, sashimi-grade fish, Suruki Supermarket is a must-visit for the many Japanese Americans in the Peninsula. Originally opened in Burlingame by grocery Shuji Suruki in 1980, the store stocks Japanese imports and ingredients, as well as house-made bento boxes, seaweed salad by the pound and sushi. For lunch, pick up hand-size, sandwich-like onigirazu stuffed with Spam and scrambled eggs or one of the 20 types of bento boxes on offer. (Fun fact: Pre-cut sashimi and prepared foods are steeply discounted at the end of the day.)

Credit cards accepted • Beer, wine and sake

650-347-5288 • www.surukisupermarket.com • Order online

This cozy izakaya attracts crowds hungry for hamachi collar and scallop dumplings.

With a menu by Marin County native Scott Whitman, formerly the executive chef of Sushi Ran in Sausalito, Village Sake neatly balances informal appeal and gorgeous presentation. Corn tempura ($11) surrounds sweet kernels in a light batter that suggests fragile soap bubbles, and scallop-garlic chive dumplings ($11) have the delicacy of fine wontons. Slow-cooked pork belly skewers ($11) are delightfully fatty and get a sprinkle of citrus-forward sansho pepper to lighten the palate. Pair your meals with something from the diverse sake list by sake sommelier Hiromi Higuchi.

Credit cards accepted • Beer, wine and sake

415-521-5790 • www.villagesake.com • Order online