On a mobile device? Try our mobile site, optimized for faster browsing.
Categories: Japanese, Sushi Bars, Lounges [Edit]
1611 E Carson StMon-Sat. 11:00 a.m. - 11:00 p.m.
Sun. 1:00 p.m. - 10:00 p.m.
Loading...
DISCLAIMER: I've only ever tried the sushi. I have no clue about the hibatchi bar.
I was delighted to see that I'm not the only one who finds this place to be completely overrated and overpriced. The sushi was your average run of the mill raw fish. Nothing special about the freshness or the imaginitivity of the rolls. That is, except for the price. I couldn't believe that a meal for such average sushi cost as much as it did.
If you're looking for some decent raw fish to feed your sushi craving, try Chaya in Squirrel Hill instead. You won't regret it.
Let me start with what works at Nakama: The servers. They're super nice and efficient.
What doesn't work is the food, the prices, the crowds, the incredibly busy, loud bar without the possibility of being seated in the quieter room (reserved only for Habachi eaters) -- even when you're paying $15.00/person FOR LUNCH! And, the restaurant demands that you dress in nice casual wear. No t-shirts, yet the food was terrible!
We shared the Spider Roll and the Chicken and Shrimp Habachi plate, as well as a seaweed salad. The salad was okay. The Spider Roll came in a sticky, overly-sweet sauce which ruined the flavor. The crab was rubbery and seemed old. The chicken Habachi was waaaaaaay overcooked (dry to the point of being hard to swallow), the shrimp smelled old , and it was NOT DEVEINED (read: it still had the poop tunnel in it!). ICK! This is supposed to be Pittsburgh's finest sushi restaurant? Old fish meets overcooked chicken, meets truly bad sushi, meets loud bar with no option to sit elsewhere (even when you're not drinking), meets overpriced lunch menu!
My advice: Go elsewhere! If you want something to eat, check out ANY other restaurant in the South Side. Even if it's bad, it won't be as expensive as Nakama. But, there are better places to be had in Pittsburgh. Not being from the area, I can't speak for sushi bars, but, I especially like The Gypsy Cafe and Primanti's in the South Side. Cheers!
My friends and I are SO into hibachi, and go quite often to various ones in the city. This time, we thought we would try Nakama. One of the other couples in our group happened to have a $50 gift card so we met them there for dinner on a Saturday evening @ 8:30.
What I can say good about the place was the service @ the bar. The man's name was Mark, and he was extremely attentive, and very detail oriented. They have Cakebread on the Wine List so I was also impressed about that. However they did not have Tanqueray 10, which was a big disappointment to my boyfriend.
Once we were seated, we couldn't even hear each other talk. We had to LITERALLY yell just to hear what the other person was saying. I'm not exaggerating when I say we were seated across from about 30 fratboy 'tools'. About every 15 minutes or so they would start some sort of football chant. It was absolutely ridiculous. Could someone not have went over there and asked nicely for them to calm down? Perhaps no, but it was disrupting the entire restaurant. And ruined nearly every other diners experience.
The food @ Nakama was ok. Compared to the other hibachi - style restaurants in the city it averaged pretty well. I didn't try the sushi, so I cannot comment on it, but the meat was fresh, and the soup and salad were the same as every where else.
The final kicker was when our bill came. We asked the gift card to be applied first, and then for the check to be split three ways. When she came back with the check, the boys signed it, threw on the tip, and then they realized the bill was far larger than it was before. We got the waitress over, she said she wasn't sure what the problem could be. Anyway, the problem was that she had ADDED $50 to each check. Instead of taking $50 away by using the gift card, she added over $100 to our bill. She blamed it on the cashier, but I didn't see a cashier here. I'm sure they deal w/ gift cards quite often and am still quite confused that lil miss smiley added over $100 to our bill and didn't even notice.
In conclusion, I'm not sure if curly q's was just bad @ math, or tried to scam us. But I would definitely not recommend a place that was reminiscent of my 'Frat Party' days. There is a place in Monroeville we visit often called, "Sawa" that is much more hip, relaxed, and far tastier. I think we will stick with that. :)
I'm a big fan of hibachi-style cooking, and my old place on the South Side was right down the street from Nakama, so I was excited to try it when I still lived there. Once was enough, I'll never go back there again.
The food was pretty terrible through and through. The meat didn't taste very fresh, the soup and salad were both forgettable, and the fried rice was AWFUL. I can't understand why this place is so popular, my best guess is that some people consider it a "classy", "cultured" destination to get drunk at. There are plenty of those types of places on the South Side already, and I'd venture a guess that even the bars serve better food.
It's interesting that one of the most crowded restaurants in the South Side (possibly, all of Pittsburgh?) has such bad ratings on Yelp. I think Yelpers have it right in the case. Nakama totally did not live up to the hype for me. I had the hibachi and it was just mediocre. The chef / entertainer wasn't even that good - no cool tricks and he didn't even try throwing food in my mouth. The place was so loud that there is no way you can have a decent conversation if you come with a group of people. And, I swear they celebrated 10 birthdays during the hour we were dining there. They have this irritating gong that they bring out. You can't hear the guy next to you, but you will hear every birthday dinner that night.
A bunch of my co-workers like Nakama's sushi bar, so when I get a chance to try it, I'll update my review. Until then, I'm not quickly planning my next Nakama outing.
This is a god-awful excuse for a restaurant. The actual serving of food is last on its list of priorities, which run something like this:
1) Having heavily-made-up waitresses treat diners rudely.
2) Functioning as a place for bald-headed men to drink.
3) Using "valet parking" to totally tie up the intersection of 17th and Carson.
4) Being a mediocre-to-poor Americanized "Japanese" restaurant.
I had sushi the only time I came here (probably about three years ago). It was really bad. Cold, rubbery rice that not only didn't have any rice vinegar in it, but wasn't properly cooked. Rolls looked like they had been created in a fit of pique by a drunken marmot or other mammal lacking opposable thumbs. And the fish, while not being actively spoiled, was not notable for its freshness either.
If you want hibachi, try Yokoso. If you want excellent, authentic sushi, try Chaya in Squirrel Hill. If you want pretty decent, cheap sushi, try Oishii Bento in Oakland. But for the love of god, don't come here for any reason.
I ate at Nakama for the first time last night, sat at the sushi bar with two friends, ordered a ton of food, and an expensive bottle of sake (which was over priced and soso in quality). Despite the money we dropped, the service was horrible, simply put; unprofessional, rude, and snotty.
Now, this place has nothing to be uppity about: THEY DO NOT EVEN UNDERSTAND WHAT SUSHI IS. It was Americanized to the extreme, the menu was embarrassing, as with the wine and sake list. The sashimi was so poorly cut you could barley chew on it, the maki was not tightly rolled. And the fish... oh the fish, no flavor.
The hipster crowd should of tipped me off, this is place for people who do not know anything about dining, and probably only eat sushi because they think it's the cool thing to do. The crowd was nothing but meat heads and trashy looking girls, the music selections we're bottom of the barrel, and the blaring sports tv's would ruin anyones dinner who cares.
now i sympathize with a lot of the reviews for nakama, but in 3 separate experiences i've never had anything close to a 1 star time. our most recent trip led us to the sushi bar where the service was lightning-fast and karma-friendly. (our waitress forgot to charge a salmon roll and ended up comping it in the end)
it may be overpriced, but isn't all sushI? the red dragon roll was worth every cent as was the hanalei. i've never ventured to the hibachi side of the road, and i just have a feeling that you'll be better off sticking to the sushi.
cheer up pretentious sushites and remember that you're in pittsburgh, not osaka!
PS. nobody's mentioned that Nakama's cougar population is flourishing.
Nakama has OK sushi. Nakama is noisy, the waiters take forever to serve you, and it's way overpriced. If you want authentic sushi go to CHAYA THE BEST SUSHI IN THE BURGH!
For the life of me, I can't understand why people rave about this place. Their sushi is lousy, and their hibachi is mediocre at best! And waaaaay overpriced.
Granted the location is great and the decor is awesome, but I as a diner I'm much more concerned about food/service quality than a gorgeous setting. Thumbs down, try Yokoso on the Waterfront.
Good food but you are paying for the atmosphere. Can't order sushi for take out past 5pm or somewhere around that time. Gets easily crowded and so loud you can't hear your friends talking. I go to the sushi place in the waterfront. Better prices and less crowded and free parking.
If you want Benihana's in Pittsburgh, I guess this is the place to go. Other than the fact that they have some marketing and advertising genius who's greased the palms of every "guide to the city" and "best restaurants" free pamphlet that they hand out at hotel concierge desks, I don't know what all the hype's about.
They have a big sushi bar area, and quite a few grills in the back. We sat at a table with some PITT football players and I ordered the filet, while TY got surf and turf. It was all kind of eh, but I have to say that customer service was very good and all the staff were really nice. The filet was tender, but I think just the flavor of everything was mediocre, especially at their prices. We had a coupon for $15 in one of the aforementioned guide books, so pick one of those up before you spend your money here.
Review for Bar/Scene Only:
My mom says my crackface cousin (she doesn't call him that) raves about this place. My random childhood friend's boss told me I should come here to meet interesting people.
I went for drinky times.
I brought a City Paper with me, as I was alone and needed some entertainment. I sat at the bar for about 20 minutes, watching everyone around me get served. Two large, bald headed gentlemen sidled up and were taken care of immediately by the bartender. Still nothing in front of me.
Eventually I was asked "Are you OK?" at which point I requested a drink list. Now, I don't really go in for too much mixed alcohol or sweet stuff, so I ended up just ordering a Pearl (cold-unfiltered) sake.
I'm not sure what people see in this place. I mean, the bar scene is almost all large and/or old(er) people who usually happen to be bald if they possess a scrotum. I mean, that's fine, that's cool. Just not what I consider a "happening scene".
Also, my bartender made me taste the sake before giving it to me. I thinke maybe he thought I didn't know what I was ordering. To be fair, I was the only one in the whole bar drinking sake, so maybe they don't sell that much of it.
The food may be tasty, but I was warned that it would "give me the poops". Can't verify that though.
Has anyone else noted the playing cards stuck to the ceiling? That's pretty cool. I also like the exposed pipes. It's really not so bad from a design standpoint. Just a Pittsburgh kind of place, I guess...
I went to the hibachi with a few friends here on a weeknight, and I didn't try the sushi so I can't speak to it. It was pretty packed and indeed, it was very loud and very dark. You seriously might want to bring a flashlight to read the menu (I'm not joking). There were only 4 of us at the hibachi table, so the fun factor was pretty dulled down, but it didn't help that you couldn't really hear what the guy was trying to say anyway. The server had a hard time hearing me as well, but my order of chicken was correct. So as for the food:
Salad - was well saturated with ginger dressing -I mean they must have tossed it with a good amount of dressing before bringing it out. The dressing was good, but definitely not that good.
Soup - salted and fine, nothing notable.
Shrimp flambe - chewy, tasteless, didn't even have the butter flavor.
Rice - steamed and fine
Chicken and veggies - dry dry dry chicken, veggies were good, and the flavors on the veggies were very good.
Sauces - okay
The ladies room:
Pretty clean, and also staffed.
Bottom line for me - I wouldn't come back here on my own volition - there are other places in Pgh I would try first.
Great location in Southside and good if you want to fulfill a Hibachi craving. However, not the greatest Hibachi, nor the most authentic either. It's also really loud in the restaurant.
I went there with my son because he really wanted to go. He loves sushi and is always excited about flying food, so what better place to go, right?
And it's always packed, which means it must be good, right?
Overall I'd say wrong.
The sushi was about the same quality that I get at Giant Eagle. You know the kind... "I'm really jonesin for some sushi, but I guess I'll take the old salmon stuck on top of crunchy cold rice because I'm too lazy to put my ass in the car and drive to Sushi Kim or some other real sushi bar."
The hibachi: Quality level on par with Benihana. Enough said. It reminds me of what a chef friend of mine said about the Spaghetti warehouse one day: "Fancy Ragu". The hibachi was fancy canned chop suey.
Oh, and the price. One adult and one 14 year old lunch (2 small plates of sushi and 2 hibachi lunches) $80.00. Someone hand me the Astroglide. Quick.
I've been sampling these kinds of establishments on both coasts for the past 15 years, from Vancouver BC to San Diego, from Miami to Boston. For what they charge, the quality should be much better and the staff should TRY to smile once in a while. Sorry, honey, but tight skirt and 17 layers of makeup can't hide a mean heart.
Here ends the rant prescribed by this reviewer for this restaurant.
I love sushi - and even though Nakama is always extremely busy and crowded, they have a great sushi menu. I had the avocado and Philadelphia roll when I was last here, but one young chef was very sweet and gave my friend and me an entire roll for free. You can't beat that!
I've tried to like Nakama, I really have. There is a serious shortage of good sushi in the Southside.....as in there are only two places to go for it. With the renovation and new ownership of the old Sushi Two into Tokyo Bistro, Nakama has dropped to last place (or 2nd), for Sushi in south side.
Nakama has style. The interior is gorgeous. This is where it all ends and goes south though. The food is very uninspired, the waits for a table are unbelievable (and unwarranted), presentation has gone downhill over the years - and the worst part: the crowd.
For some reason, Nakama has turned into a singles scene. Please explain to me how a sushi & hibachi restaurant is now a meat-market? (fish market? hehe) Any given night of the week, you will find scantily clad fake women (could be a good thing), and old rich perverts trying to pick them up......cougars, suburbanites, screaming children....it's nuts. At peak dinner hours, you literally have to fight your way through everything. You'd think you stepped into Town Tavern by accident or something!
The other issue, and the reason why I am marking it bad for groups, is the lack of larger tables dedicated solely to sushi eaters. If you have a large group of people, you may as well pass. You can either camp out and wait for a bunch of seats to open up at the sushi bar, or sit at a hibachi grill - which is terrible for the cook if everyone in your party wants sushi.
Here are some final pros to balance this out a little bit and explain why I gave it two stars:
- Great drinks...best bloody mary I've had.
- Awesome for late night food once it clears out
- Good lunch specials
- The aforementioned interior space
But if you really want good sushi, go to Umi in Shadyside or Pennsylvania Fish Company on Penn Ave in the strip. Nakama is not the place.
The food is great if you are there for food and if it was still 2005. The sushi is sub-par and on more than one occasion I've left their feeling a bit ill from it.
As another reviewer wrote, "Nakama has turned into a singles scene. " I don't understand this phenomenon either as if you are there for more than 5 minutes you cannot go anywhere else without smelling like the inside of that place. You also have to wash your clothes twice to get it out, it's almost worse than cigarette smoke.
My sister & I went to the sushi bar on a Sunday afternoon and I was quite pleased. The chefs at the bar were very friendly and chatty (though I'm sure that had something to do with how empty the place was), and we got a ton of sushi for under $40. My sister got the spider rolls and I ended up stealing a few because they were so tasty. I live in Chicago, and the prices were pretty comparable to cheaper sushi there, so it was a great deal. My sister keeps saying we have to go back over the holidays, and I definitely agree!
EDIT: So we went back on Saturday and this time shared the maki platter, some Spider rolls, and the Hanalei rolls.
The hanalei rolls were by far the best sushi I have ever had. I am still having dreams about them.
That's all.
I worked at a top notch sushi restaurant and was educated very well with the real definition of sushi over summer. and having come back to pittsburgh and eating at nakama, i was sadly disappointed. no one knows what they're serving and it's just a trendy place that pretends to serve sushi for people to say they "eat sushi". the drinks and bar section is fun and the tvs are great for games. but i would not go back there for any food any time soon.
Excellent spot for hibachi and sushi with friendy staff and quick service.
The Chicken Diablo dinner was delicious
I didn't enjoy any of the sushi especially the Philly Roll, which was inedible.
Its located on a corner in a trendy bar laden section of town. and was extremely packed. I found it odd to see white/black mid 20 yr old's making the sushi. Not that ONLY Asians or older experienced people can make sushi, but maybe this is part of the reason.
I will mention that I did not try the hibachi, which is what I hear is their best part.
You would think by the crowds in this place it was the only sushi place in the whole city of Pittsburgh. I went in with good expectations of this place considering it is always crowded.....boy was I wrong!!!
First off the service at this place is horrible. This is mostly a 22-28 yr old staffed place. The hostess basically laughed at me when I said we did not have a reservation, offered us to have a drink at the bar, and then said "but you cannot stand around in this area here around the door it is getting too crowded so either the bar or maybe wait outside" ...seriously you don't tell a customer that.
We just wanted sushi anyways, so we sat at the sushi bar and ordered some rolls and sashimi. Now maybe I am spoiled from living on the west coast for so long now that I am used to Asians (usually Japanese..go figure) working and making my sushi. There were 3 white guys about 25 yrs old making my rolls for me, not to say they cannot do it as well as anyone else, but the rolls were seriously not that great. Hell I did not even see an Asian person working at the tables either, they were mostly Mexican guys.
Sorry, I know most of the reviews are raving about how good this place is, but to me it seems pretty pricey for what you get and the food is not all that. I can only speak for the sushi...maybe the dinners at the tables are better. To sum it up this is mostly an over priced sushi bar that is a good place to hang out and have drinks with friends and maybe hit on some groups of women out for dinner.
ICK--avoid this place. I took one bite of the sushi and stopped eating it. It tasted funny and waaaaaay fishy. Our chef wasn't Asian but some white guy who didn't knock my socks off. All he did was toss some high sodium sauce on some veggies and meat, stir them around, and serve them on our plates. My stomach hurt less than 1 hour after I ate there...'nuff said.
This is my favorite restaurant. The whole thing is fun to watch, and thought that would be their gimmick, but the food turned out to be amazing.
I've never liked any seafood but their shrimp appetizer is so good! The only place I'd ever eat seafood (besides my occasional bouts with sushi).
I got Chicken & Steak hibachi dinner all three times I've been there. I got filets the third time for the steak and it was worth the extra three dollars.
It is kind of sad that the performance of the hibachi chefs varies a lot from person to person, as the second time I went was by far the nicest to watch, but all three were very good.
This is my birthday restaurant now. ;)
Sushi was okay. Nothing special, but a little better than Little Tokyo. Bartender was rude. Made my French Kiss martini incorrectly (I watched as he poured an imitation chambord liquor). Hiachi was okay. Soup was way too salty. Salad was good. The chix and steak were pretty good. Service was horrible. Had to pass all used dishes to the waitress across the grill. Will not hurry back.
Love it. I can't speak to the sushi menu, but the hibachi experience is first rate and in my opinion superior to Benihana or any of the other chains in the suburbs. The Japanese cooks here are often transplants from larger cities like New York or San Francisco and know what they are doing. The drinks are also excellent and there is a vibrant bar scene. If you want something a bit more upscale than the usual fare on the South Side, Nakama is your place.
fun restaurant, EXTREMELY rude people working there.
I would suggest confirming your reservation multiple times, at least 3.
---BEGIN RANT---
I went here with a group of 10 people, we made the reservation a week in advance, and when we showed up on a Saturday night the place was PACKED, the wait for a table would be 2 hours, and our reservation was nowhere to be found.
Lost reservation was bad, but to top it off the hosts and hostess had MAJOR attitude insisting that we were lying about making a reservation, arguing with us for no reason, and generally making us feel very unwelcome.
Personally I don't enjoy being treated like crap when all I want to do is bring your restaurant lots of business.
Just because your restaraunt is decorated in a trendy way and serves sushi doesn't mean you aren't in Pittsburgh, so lose the NYC attitude Nakama!
---END RANT---
So... I usually only eat in the Sushi bar/bar area because I am not into the whole hibachi thing. This place is usually very busy for Happy Hour, so if you just want to eat and not worry about a crowd, try a different place or come at a different time. Otherwise, it can be amusing to people watch here.
Personally, I come for the Sushi. Ever since my friend introduced me to the Hanalei roll, I can't resist it. Shrimp tempura, cream cheese, some other stuff, then tempura batter fried. Tastes so much better than it sounds, worth the $14 price tag (if done right) as it is double the standard sized roll. The other rolls are all decent and the sashimi servings are huge. If you are on a first date, beware - the pieces of sushi are so gigantic that you'll either 1) look like a pig stuffing it all into your mouth or 2) risk having the entire piece fall apart all over you as you try to daintily take normal bite sizes out of the sushi-piece. You decide whether you will go for option 1 or 2! Oh, and just say NO to the tempura appetizer. It's not tempura, that would actually be Japanese style. No, what you will get if you order the tempura is American-style beer-battered shrimp and 3 pieces of vegetables, all for 11 bucks. Blech.
Service is always a bit shoddy in the bar area, but to be fair, that place gets crazy busy. So... Food, 4; Service 2-3 depending on the night and business; atmosphere, 3. But hey, if you just want that busy happy hour scene, this is a place to go to! P.S. Parking can be a pain. It's Carson in the Southside, what do you expect?
This is my favorite teppanyaki-style restaurant. Awesome food. Their shrimp sauce is amazing. You will not leave hungry!! The atmosphere is unique and interesting. Definitely a fun place to be with friends.
I go here a few times a month, mostly because I think the bar scene is probably one of the most fun in Pittsburgh. It gets pretty crowded especially on the weekends, but the staff does a good job especially after you go there a few times and they know who you are. It's the only place I know of in Pittsburgh that on any given day (even a monday or tuesday) there will be a good crowd at the bar with a higher girl to guy ratio than the usual dudefest at most bars. The hibachi is better than most. It's definitely better than benihana, but probably not as good as Shogun in Monroeville. The only thing I don't like about the hibachi (or any hibachi) is that after the meal you smell like a diner short order cook because of the oil from the grill. The other menu items are pretty average at best. The marinated beef tips and chicken lettuce wraps are okay appetizers. The edaname is pretty hard to mess up and the miso soup is about average. The sushi is awful. I mean I guess the rolls are edible, but you can hide the quality by adding a lot of junk to cover up the flavor. The sashimi (whish is really all that I order) I found to be really poor quality and the way it was sliced was not at all how sashimi should be sliced. I really don't understand how this place wins best overall restaurant and best sushi in Pittsburgh. It really makes no sense. Most of the people I know agree that the hibachi is good, but overall the restaurant isn't that good and the sushi not good at all. However, I have a friend who is one of the chefs assures me that the quality of ingredient is good. Overall, I suggest if you eat here the hibachi is pretty good and fun if you are having a sit down dinner. If you are eating at the bar try to stick to the edamame or maybe one of the appetizers mentioned. I strongly suggest staying away from the sushi, but if you must stick to the most basic of rolls (california roll, etc.). In fact, if you are not sitting down for hibachi go eat at Dish on the same street and head to Nakama only for the bar.
One of the more popular/trendy places to be, always busy (youll need a reservation for the habachi tables, and be prepared to wait to get a spot at the sushi bar). However, im not a sushi person, so I cant comment on that. The food here is certainly good, but I wouldnt go so far as to say spectacular (definitely had better hibachi steak, & fried rice was disappointing). Props for the atmosphere, service, and relatively moderate pricing (for these kind of places)
the sushi is about a 3. I would go for the hibachi. the place is always packed so mkae reservations for the weekend.
Pittsburgh, PA
Category: Sushi Bars
Pittsburgh, PA
Category: Japanese
Pittsburgh, PA
Category: Japanese
Pittsburgh, PA
Category: Sushi Bars
Pittsburgh, PA
Category: British
