Izakaya Wasa

$ 60 for three ppl during happy hour and we weren’t even half full — come for the drinks and appetizers during happy hour, not the dainty food portions

I was craving sushi for a super long time, so when we were at spectrum, my boyfriend directed us to this place to try. I checked out the happy hour menu, which had $ 3.50 rolls and other cheap appetizers, so I was excited to try.
We ended up getting pretty much all the salads on the happy hour menu, the edamame, the shu mai, a couple of rolls, and a beef and mushroom plate (not on happy hour). The tofu and tomato salad was good, but it honestly wasn’t anything super special. Seaweed salad was a step up from that, I think. Between the two, I would go for the seaweed again, because it was super light and refreshing. The rolls were okay. They were super small to be quite honest, and I don’t know if it was because it was on happy hour or not (cutting back because we’re not paying full price)? The shu mai was just awful. Now, I do not go to dimsum super often, but I did grow up getting it once in a while, and shu mai is my absolute favorite for dimsum. When these came out, I literally hesitated to eat them because they looked so unlike what I am used to. My boyfriend’s mom said that they looked like the frozen type where they just reheat and serve. The taste was terrible as well. None of us wanted to finish the plate… how sad. The only thing that made up for it was the beef and mushroom plate which was the most delicious of all the things we ordered. We all gobbled that one up in less than 10 minutes, but even with all we ordered, we left still hungry. My boyfriend’s mom ended up making a second dinner later on xD
It was a nice place to try, but I do not think I will be back. If I did come back, it would definitely not be for anything on happy hour.

The sushi was okay. The wait however was ridiculous. Took almost an hour and a half to get our food.

Best $ 100 I ever spent on sushi. Ordered take out on a busy Friday night. Everything was perfect! They have curbside pickup by valet too. Softeshell crab, sashimi, seaweed salad, steak. everything was excellent. Will be back for more.

My BF and I come here all the time for their happy hour because it’s so good! The service is so so unless you get jasmine she’s amazing. There’s also a boy who is a host, Patrick who is great and should be promoted to a server to replace some other ones who aren’t so good. Overall i recommend coming for their happy hour to give it a try!

Not sure why this place isn’t ranked higher. My gf think they have the best haply hour AROUND! Take a look at the pics below: 3 full rolls for $ 11. $ 11!!! That’s what one cocktail at Javier’s would get you! Haply hour rolls are $ 3.50 and they have plenty of options — I believe their haply hour is Friday — Sunday from 3 – 6. Don’t miss it and if you haven’t been I strongly urge you to give it a try!
HIGHLY recommend!

Happy hour is a great value. The maki selection is limited to California roll, spicy tuna roll, spicy shrimp roll and a salmon roll. Average sushi at best, but they are 8 piece rolls for only $ 3.50 each and for that price average looks pretty good. There are other appetizers and small plates too. We liked the crab shumai and also the seaweed salad was really good. Sapporo draft beer is $ 2.50 a glass. The service was excellent. They have a small outdoor seating area which is pleasant. Izakaya Wasa is close to the theater so it is convenient for a bite before or after the movie. Gotta recommend for the happy hour.

We have passed Izakaya Wasa probably 100 times in Irvine Spectrum.
For some reason, we’ve never tried the place.
We finally stepped in for the first.
And we were quite happy with our dinner experience.
We ordered two entrees to share.
The first one was Poke Don.
Large pieces of fresh sashimi included salmon, tuna, albacore, yellowtail, halibut, and shrimp.
The poke sauce was traditional style with sesame oil.
We prefer the Japanese style poke more than the American style with mayonnaise sauce.
The poke bowl was very good, and portion was huge.
It also came with a bowl of miso soup.
The second entrée was the 3 items combination dinner.
There were so many good choices for the items, and it was hard to decide what items to order.
We opted for teriyaki beef, sesame chicken, and spicy tuna rolls.
When the bento box came to the table, we were very surprised by how large the portion was.
Included with the 3 items were miso soup, rice, salad, seaweed salad, and shumai.
We were expecting 2 pieces of spicy tuna rolls with the combination.
Instead we got 8 pieces, a whole roll!
Teriyaki beef was cooked to medium. Very tender.
The teriyaki sauce was not overly sweet, just the way we like it.
Sesame chicken was not bad, but it wasn’t what we expected.
We thought it was the fried chicken pieces without any sauce.
Izakaya Wasa’s version had a sweet and spicy sauce over the fried chicken.
Love the seaweed salad and Japanese shumai.
Ｗe are glad that now we have another great choice for food in Irvine Spectrum.
Will definitely return again to try more food on the menu.

Great service and location. The mall is very charming. The food is 5 star quality. I do recommend the combo cause of their value for money.

Happy Hour was pretty dank. Had all rolls on special and the pork gyouza + crab shimai. D.A.N.K.
Can’t wait to come back.

Izakaya Wasa has some of the best happy hour deals! Let me just start off by saying a couple things… my #1 pet peeve is when restaurants place a huge sign outside their doors indicating their amazing happy hour deals… only to find that the deals are only $ 1 or $ 2 off their normal prices. My #2 pet peeve is when happy hours are at ridiculous times like «9−10PM» on a Tuesday night. I’m sorry, no one has energy to go out to enjoy a buck off your fries at 10pm, especially on a Tuesday…
Thankfully, Izakaya Wasa doesn’t do either of these, as their happy hour deals are truly worth it and they have their happy hour… wait for it… 6 DAYS A WEEK (including weekends)! Mon-​Thurs is 3PM-6:30PM and Saturday & Sunday is 12PM-​4PM.
Their deals are also amazing. They have starters for about $ 4 and their cut rolls are only $ 3.50!!! They are all normally around $ 7-​$ 9 so you’re saving quite a bit when you dine in for their happy hour. They only have four options: California, Spicy Tuna, Spicy Shrimp, and Salmon but it’s more than enough variety for me. For those age 21+, they also have several beers included in their happy hour as well.
I normally get their spicy tuna, spicy shrimp, and salmon cut rolls. Rolls are on the smaller side, but that’s totally understandable because of the price. Salmon roll comes with a good chunk of avocado with each bite, spicy shrimp is cooked shrimp with some masago eggs sprinkled on top, and spicy tuna is, well, the normal spicy tuna. My favorite is the spicy tuna since I tend to find larger amounts of fish compared to the other rolls, but that’s just my personal opinion. Their appetizers on the happy hour are pretty good too, though I see most people ordering the cut rolls. If you like heavy, garlic edamame, you will LOVE Wasa’s rendition of their garlic edamame.
Service is alright and the restaurant is actually considered a higher-​end restaurant, compared to a lot of other sushi restaurants. They have cute little booths separated by cloths, giving it a cute and semi-​authentic Japanese feeling. Outdoor seating is nice as well.
To sum it up, if my sushi craving is baddd, I’ll make a visit to Izakaya Wasa because I know for the amount of sushi I’ll be ordering, I still won’t break the bank. Definitely a great place for a nice lunch/​dinner and to bring friends and dates to!

I came here a week ago with my brothers. The salmon sashimi was very delicious and the service was great!!! Nice chill and relaxed spot for great sushi!

I’ve been to Wasa maybe 8 – 10 times now. My company insists on it being the go to easy sushi spot. Before the service was quick and reliable and the last two times it has been ungodly slow. A quick 25 minute lunch has now turned into an hour + ordeal where I find myself devouring my food in 5 minutes after waiting an hour for it. Today’s service has been prompt and not so bad. We instantly got our table, drink and maybe a 18 minute wait for food. Not impressed with the time frame considering only ¼ of the restaurant is actually filled with customers. Our server Maya is prompt and better than some of other servers I’ve come across who seem to lollygag. Overall the food quality is great for the price. You can’t beat the lunch bento box deal. Yummy chicken gyoza

Only have been here once but we are definitely looking forward to coming back.
I was in the mood for sushi and we walked by to check out prices around 6:00p Wednesday night. We saw the awesome happy hour deals posted outside and HH ends at 6:30p… YAS!!! We practically ran into the place, got a table immediately, and placed our order with plenty of time to spare.
I think the spicy tuna rolls (8 pcs) were less than $ 4! We got 2 spicy tuna rolls, garlic edamame, chicken gyoza, and 2 sodas for about $ 22!!! Everything was very tasty. Good wasabi. Nice, prompt service and they were busy too! The place is small inside but very cute. Super clean. Bathrooms are clean.
Win win win!!!

Izakaya Wasa is located inside the Irvine Spectrum. They get quite busy especially over the weekend. The nice part is they will take your phone number down and call you when your table is ready so you can walk around the mall while you wait.
We both had the chirashi bowl. We upgraded from the regular chirashi to the special. It was definitely worth it. The fish was fresh and the bowl was full of high quality items, including fatty tuna, a generous amount of uni, scallop, and several other fish.
We tried one of their rolls with salmon and thinly sliced lemon on it. I thought the taste was just okay but the fish is very fresh. They also have omakase but we didn’t try that.
The service is good and fast. We didn’t wait long for our table even on a weekend. The wait for 2 was about 15 minutes.

My cousin and I came here to eat. Their food was okay at best, very expensive. We had a server who was an older lady, and she was absolutely horrendous. Terrible server. She only came to put in our orders and never checked back on us. (We probably looked like kids to her that wouldn’t be able to tip.) There was a table of business men right across from us who were checked on regularly whilst we had to wave down the BUSSER to get our check.
Note: Treat all your guests equally, regardless of age and looks, maybe you’ll get a nice tip.

I love coming in for their happy hour! I work right across from Wasa so I always come in before work, after work, or my lunch break. I always get the same thing.
* Spicy Tuna Roll
* Spicy Salmon Roll
* Seaweed Salad
It fills me up, and I love their seaweed salad! Every sushi restaurant I go to literally slaps a little handful of seaweed salad onto a plate and sends it out. They never look at presentation. The presentation here for the salad is beautiful and I love how it comes with so many cucumbers and shaved carrots. For HH you would think they would give you like a pinch of seaweed salad but they’re so generous
Miso soup is nice and hot. Not lukewarm like most places.
Salmon roll, fish isn’t that fresh but it’ll do. Spicy tuna is good, but could be a bit spicier!
***My way of eating seaweed salad is mixing it with lemon juice and sriracha sauce. Sounds weird but it’s sooo good and I think it makes the flavor bolder.

First of all I would like to give recognition on how great of a worker Kelly is! Since it was our first visit he gave us recommendations on what rolls we should try. We settled for the Avalon, dinner special bento boxes (comes with two options of rolls or sashimi), and the albacore with crispy onions. I would strongly recommend getting the Avalon roll! It was just a perfectly balanced roll. I would come back for the Avalon alone. The albacore with onions was a smaller dish but it definitely made an impression. The bento box is very reasonably priced and was perfect for a quick dinner or lunch meal.
Overall everything was perfect! If you don’t know the menu well I would suggest asking for the more popular rolls. The workers really do know best!

Walked right in in a saturday night at 6… not sure if my husband and I were supposed to wait to be seated, so we sat ourselves at the bar. No one greeted us upon entry.
The sushi chefs wanted nothing to do with us.
A server greeted us promptly with menus.
We ordered a few dishes from the sushi chef. He disappeared for the remainder of our meal so when we wanted to order more, we had to give our menu selections to a different chef.
After 20 minutes we still hadn’t received our additional dishes. Our original chef got extremely defensive when the manager stopped over and we mentioned this.
Overall, sushi was great but service was terrible.

This was my second time coming to Izakaya at Spectrum. Both times we were greater nicely and immediately given a seat.
I have tried a variety of their sushi as well as their Chirashi Bowl. The chirashi bowl was amazing colorful and the assorted fish were pretty fresh.
The service could definitely improve. We waited quit sometime for a server to acknowledge us even though they were not too busy.