mthe

I apologize for posting this late.  The week has gone by too quickly for us during this soft opening time.  But here it is, as Don posted above:

RAKUYA's Soft Opening Special Offer Only for DR Members

We would like  to extend the following offer to all DR Members:

For each dish ordered, Get a 2nd dish of equal or lesser value free.

The above offer is good during dinner hours only until August 31, 2016. 

As Don mentioned above, there is no exchange of benefit between Rakuya and DR for offering members this deal.   This is a very important point to Don and myself.  I offer this because I feel that I am a part and member of this DR.com community and simply want to have other fellow members try us without having to pay full price during soft opening period.  And I do not expect to receive any write-ups either.  

To take advantage of this offer, reservation is required by emailing me directly at mthe@rakuasiandining.com.  Please, state in the email that you are a DR member.  I can be a little flexible if there are some who are not able to make it during this vacation period.  Just email me and let me know when you would like to come, I will do my best to accommodate.

Best to all,

Marcel

Rakuya

Hello, it's Marcel here over at Rakuya-Japanese Kitchen + Bar.  We have just started our soft opening stage this past weekend.   Although we have gone through training and a week of serving friends and family, we were still hoping that we would be able to quietly soft open and utilize this time to continue training our staff, and improve our operations.  As much as we'd like to fly under the radar during this stage, we realize this is difficult to do, since there are quiet a few internet sites and publications which focus on restaurant opening announcements.  Having said that, I do appreciate Cheezepowder for the posting above regarding our opening.  As indicated by Cheezepowder, we have not gone live with Rakuya website yet.  This will happen some time this week.  At the moment we are only open 6 dinners (closed on Monday).  We may start serving lunch in the next 2 weeks.  

A brief description of our menu by Chefs Masaru Homma & Ken Yamashiro Ballogdajan: 

Kitchen menu for dinner consists of Japanese small to mid size dishes that are both contemporary and traditional.  There are sashimi, sushi rolls, and ramen as well. Bar menu focuses on a nice selection of Premium Sake, Shochu, and fine Japanese Whiskeys and Craft Beers. 

Please, come and enjoy our new food and drinks in our newly renovated space.

Marcel The

We have not been here in quite some time but stopped by on a Saturday night in the Bethesda location. I cannot understand how this place does well. No where close to what it was when Mark Miller first opened the D.C. location in the mid-90's. Everything we had was awful. I felt like I was Gordon Ramsey eating for the first time in one of his restaurants in Kitchen Nightmares except for the place was packed.

Calamari was tough and tasted frozen.

Ocean roll, which is supposed to be a seafood spring roll had no seafood in it, had been fried well past its prime and was filled with whole and slimy shiitake mushrooms.

Miso Sea Bass had no hint of Miso and was swimming in a eerily orange glowing sauce that the waitress described as a tomato ginger sauce (no hint of ginger either).

The only good think about the place was that the customer service was good. We complained about each of the items we were served and were not charged for some of them.

Needless to say, we will not be back.

I'm sorry you were unhappy with our food. If you would like to call me at 301.213.1652, I will be more than happy discuss it with you further and rectify it for you.

Marcel The

Raku

Marcel,

Thanks very much for the kind words. Now that you've outed yourself, would you mind offering up some advice on Raku? Many people aren't quite sure what the restaurants are all about, or even if they're under the same ownership. I'd love to know several things that you recommend there, and I suspect others would too. (I know it's always a restaurateur's first instinct to say "everything is good, or else we wouldn't have it," but I thought I'd at least ask - it's been quite awhile since I've been to either Raku, and some guidance would be much appreciated.)

Cheers,

Rocks

Sure! The two locations were not run by the same management for a very long time. But they are now. We have slowly/ gradually changed much of the menu items so they are the same as Bethesda location. We would like to do away from stir fry eventually, but too many people are still favoring that now. There are still much to be done at DC location. To accomodate these changes (menu and atmosphere wise) some major renovation to the kitchen, sushi bar, dining room is needed. We are hoping to do this in the winter months. I can go into more details with you if you want (maybe via email or phone is better).

We generally recommend customers to focus more on our sushi, appetizers, salads, entrees, and also what is on the special paper as opposed to noodles/ stir fry.

Our executive chef, Masaru Homma, is very particular about quality of ingredients that he uses. Much of our fish come from Japan.

As far as service, we have made much changes in our seating policies in DC since we took over. We now accept reservations for both locations. Bethesda has just undergone a major facelift and looking much nicer and fresher.

But I'm continuing to make changes to improve, I will never stop. There is always things to improve. If anyone has any concerns or issues that they would like to bring up, I am always available to our customers anytime. I would love to hear from you.

I will stop here and perhaps continue more later with response to any specific questions or comments later.

Thank you Mr. Rockwell for the opportunity. I hope I have answered some of your questions but if not I'm always available to you.

Mthe@rakuasiandining.com

301.213.1652

My name is Marcel The. I am a partner at Raku. We have very high regards for the quality of this site, both in the way it's run/ moderated and quality of its members. Though I have often visited the site for the past 5 years, this is my first time ever posting. If anyone have any questions/ comments regarding our restaurants, I will be gladly respond on this forum. Mr. Rockwell, hats off on having an excellent site all these years; a well managed forum for all of us the industry and consumers.

Marcel The

Raku