IZAKAYA RINTARO

Lots of nice dishes. Doesn't really have much of an izakaya feeling (relatively upscale / formal)

I tried this place not to long ago and it is delicious!!
My dear friend and I got lucky and sat the counter yay! We both got the set menu, which was 75.00 per person, and I was not disappointed! ✨️
I loved all the courses. #6 course, you have either choice: Kake Udon OR Manodofu Don . I wanted a soup so we both chose Kake Udon. The egg with Kake Udon was so Divine. ????
And can we mention the dessert?! ???? I was in heaven with the 'Hojicha Panna Cotta' just the right amount of sweet & the almond cookie with it? Yum!
The bathroom is immaculate, nice esthetics, the door was so cool ????
The parking is only street. I was lucky enough to get a spot in front of the restaurant.
I am looking forward to return with more dear friends. ???? ❤️ ????

Skewers and sushi are amazing

If you look at it as a whole, this place is fine. The ambience is great, beautiful interior. If you're seated at the bar service is sufficiently attentive. The hostess both times, was very friendly and patient.

This is my 2nd time here and I realized now that perhaps, they are better at the other dishes that are not yakitori. But at the same time, it doesn't seem like their focus is yakitori/grilled food, so perhaps that is worth forgiving. After all, they have more dishes on the menu that are not grilled. Below are my thoughts of the dishes I tried.

- Grilled items. I wish they had a slightly bigger selection. One personal issue I have with the yakitori specifically is that they're way too "clean". The guy at the grill is very talented, the cooking is excellent. But.... I personally like a little more smoke, and a stronger punch of the tare. Some of the dishes are salty enough w/o the accompaniments like yuzu kosho.

- The sashimi here is rather good for a place that doesn't focus solely on sushi/sashimi. They even provide real wasabi. I don't know why people are complaining in the reviews below - did you expect omakase level quality?

- Nuta here could be better balanced. Too much white miso.

- Dons are OK but nothing special. If you want to fill yourself up it's a decent strategy.

- They had an eel master visiting from Japan. Frankly, for the price the eel kabayaki was just.. fine. Nothing mind blowing, and I've had better in my travels.

- Decent drink selection. Good choice of wines too. If you get an asahi here, you'll be paying $1-2 more than what you would at other places, just fyi.

Overall, this is decidedly more of a "restaurant" and not a place to come in, grab a few skewers and a beer on a whim. Even the substantial bar is reservation seating only. It takes the "izakaya/yakitori" concept to a slightly "refined" level and the business model works well in a place like SF.

So far both visits were good experiences, but slightly underwhelming. Perhaps it's the sheer difficulty of grabbing reservations at reasonable hours. Or the price to quality ratio. Or just the massive amount of praise this place received over the years compared to the actual experience? Not sure.

Personally I prefer Ippuku in Berkeley. You might too if you like more of a "bar" setting. It's the bay area original, now in it's 13th or 14th year, and so far no other izakaya or yakitori place has topped it.

A friend and I tried this. We enjoyed the food (e.g., udon noodles were excellent) even though it's a bit pricey.