Sakae Sushi

Don’t let the looks fool you. The food is great! The rolls are inventive and tasty. Everything was fresh. Thank you Unilocal as I would have kept walking by this place.

Drive in on Memorial Day Monday, and our daughters birthday and found this gem open at 9:30 pm. We had the best sushi and service! Super fresh food and a cozy atmosphere. The young men that served us were so great and made sure we had everything we wanted, even though I’m sure they almost died when we walked in so late with our large family of 6. We’ll be hitting this place every time we come to Newport.

So so sushi. Sakae roll was very good. Free large hot sake with a minimum purchase of $ 25 (excluding AYCE) was even better. So here’s where it all goes wrong. We’re all ID’d and waiting for our dishes and the sake to arrive. I’m with 3 other friends, all over 21, including myself. My first roll, the pink lady, arrives by an older gentleman who, when asking «pink lady?», to which I raise my hand, immediately puts down the dish (not in front of me, mind you) and demands «ID! Let me see ID!» Well… Okay then. He takes it, brings it to the kitchen, and holds it against the light. I’m watching this from a distance laughing my ass off. Do you need a UV light? Should I call a police officer to help you out with that? What an asshole. The food is not good enough to stand this type of treatment and if he does it to me, he’ll do it to you. There are 20 sushi places within a 3 mile radius, DO NOT PICK HERE

I’m essentially too much of a lazy bastard to take the time to leave reviews but felt it necessary to do so for this place. I came for a pickup at lunch and was met with extreme hospitality when I walked inside, made to feel like I was a guest at someone’s home. While my order was being finished the chef was giving me free rolls to sample while the hostess immediately served me lemon water without my having to request. I was blown away by the service, friendly attitude and overall great environment inside. Topping the experience off and surprisingly almost an afterthought was how delicious the sushi itself was. Extremely fresh, large but not excessive portions, and packed with flavor. If you’re in Newport, GO HERE!

Good Sushi, but pieces were sticking to each other and kind of hard to separate. End pieces of the rolls were a little too big. Good short-​ribs. Spicy pork was ok. May come back.

This place is awesome!!! Fun experience great food. Believe it or not the portions are even bigger than what they serve in Texas.

My brother and sister in-​law were visiting from Oklahoma so I wanted them to experience some good sushi. We chose this place because of the free sake and it was close to the beach. I’m a vegetarian and I’ve had some amazing vegetarian crunch rolls at other places but when I asked if he could make a vegetarian version he said no, that it wouldn’t work. I ended up ordering the only vegetarian thing they had, which ended up being rolls the size of a grande Starbucks lid. How am I supposed to eat that?! I was very disappointed. My brother got the spicy tuna and seemed to be impressed. This place might be ok for meat eaters but definitely not for vegetarians or vegans.

Yay to Kevin!
The baja roll suggestion won my sushi heart! And I had spicy edamame, YUM.
The service was great. Atmosphere, great. And Kevin was so friendly!

Amazing sushi and even better staff! The chefs came out and greeted us after we were done eating. They know how to treat their customers very well. They went above and beyond in my experience.
Well exceeded my expectations!

The plainest Janest sushi I’ve ever had. Price was right but damn for Newport Beach, you’d think they’d have some blue fin tuna.

I hate this place. I eat a lot of sushi and this place is the bottom of the barrel. Most likely never coming here agin. Not only was the service bad and slow, the store managers seem cheap and rude. They have only one waiter for their shop. One might argue that it’s a small shop but I felt bad for the poor kid watching him trying to handle multiple requests from 5 different parties. It was especially busy that Friday night.
The sushi is subpar. It tastes like canned sushi and they overload everything with rice. The rice to fish ratio makes it unbearable to keep ordering. It’s like they don’t want you to come back.
And on top of that. It’s one of the most expensive prices for Ayce I’ve seen out there. Also their Ayce cuts out all the good things about their regular menu!
Avoid this place at all costs. The current rating of 4 stars is very misleading or people in Newport Beach have no good sushi options. You have been warned.

I don’t understand how this restaurant is rated so high on here ( Unilocal). This was probably one of the worst all you can eat (AYCE) sushi restaurants that i’ve been too. Not only is it way overpriced but the menu is very limited and the fish portion is lacking tremendously. My girlfriend and I paid $ 29.99 for each person which was around ($ 65 together) for the AYCE option and were very disappointed.
The menu is very limited to what you can order in terms of rolls. If you’re paying $ 30 for all you can eat sushi i expect to have the whole menu available. Instead they limit you to all the cheap rolls which just have imitation crab, and a maybe a little sliver of tuna on top (i think there were 3 that had actual fish on it from the menu and the rest were just variations of crab meat). When we ordered the sushi which was just tuna and rice, the portions were way out of proportion. There was about 60% rice and 40% fish, you can tell that they were skimping out on the fish and tried to get us full with the large portions of rice. Seriously!!! if you charge such a large premium for AYCE (29.99) at least offer some benefits to the customer. The average AYCE sushi prices are around ($ 21.99) and have access to the whole menu.
All in all, this place is way overpriced for what you get, the AYCE menu is very limited in that you can pretty much only order rolls with crab meat, they give you way too much rice with the sushi in hopes to fill you up on rice and save money by having to give you less fish, and the restaurant is very small. I would never recommend this place to anyone, go on here and search for a different AYCE place or you both you and your wallet will leave dissatisfied.

This is likely one of the worst AYCE places I have ever been to. The prices are astronomical for such a limited menu. For $ 30, I expect a full menu with appetizers and at the very least, edamame but edamame was extra here.
The rice to fish ratio was different every single time our order came. The first time, the rice was a huge ball and fish was very thick. The tuna didn’t taste fresh at all. The fish color was different every time and the knife cuts were different every time.
For $ 30, I could’ve went to Asahi or Sake 2 Me. This place was not worth $ 30. I was really disappointed by the menu. After seeing the menu, I really considered leaving.
I took my boyfriend here for his birthday as a last minute Hail Mary because he wanted AYCE sushi instead of going to a seafood restaurant in the area. I wanted it to be special and this place had four stars so I figured it might be a good place.
I was so wrong. If my boyfriend had known the price, he would’ve had us leave.
The only good part of our experience was the rolls which were pretty big and tasty but the nigiri was not great. The staff was friendly but I’m just really disappointed by this place.
I won’t be back.

You can not go wrong here.
Hot Cheetos roll is on fire!
Gins special is a great item.
Do not order all you can eat… Don’t be that guy.

Our server, Yoon, took great care of us during our visit here for my birthday. I got a free yogurt soju and 2 large hot sakes (1^st one b/​c we checked in on Unilocal.the 2^nd one… idk)! The owner came to greet us as well. Everyone’s so friendly!
The sushi was reasonably priced and delicious. I got the nude roll (Salmon with lemon) and it tasted very fresh. There’s also an AYCE option for $ 25 for lunch (M-​F) or $ 30 for dinner & weekends. However, the list doesn’t include a lot of specialty rolls, so I got a la carte instead.
The place is a bit small, but it gives off a cozy vibe. If you don’t mind sitting at the bar, call in to reserve a table. I’ve always drove passed this place from Seaside, but never noticed it. until now (Thanks Unilocal!). I’ll be back (:

My first time here was great,
Everyone was super friendly & attentive,
But most importantly the sushi was yummmay !
I’ll be back :)

We have been coming here for the last 5yrs and just now writing this review.
We have never had an issue with the sushi or sashimi here, always fresh and top quality. Service is sometimes a hit or miss, especially when they are busy. I would suggest to sit at a table versus the sushi bar, which seems odd for a sushi restaurant, but you will get better service.
It can get a little loud at times but the quality of the sushi makes up for it. The owner is always out greeting his customers and is genuinely happy that you are there.

This place has great sushi! Very fresh and tasty. I came here on a Friday night with my girl friends and even though we had a little bit of a wait, the service was very good and they got us a table as quickly as they could. Considering the size of this restaurant (it’s small!!) I wouldn’t suggest coming here with more than 4 people– considering their largest table is for 4 people.
Thank you to our exceptionally nice waiter last night!

My boyfriend and I came to Sakae Sushi while staying at a beach house in Newport. It was the closest walking distance sushi joint to us, so we decided to try them out. I enjoyed them very much.
I ordered a Rainbow Roll and a Philadelphia Roll. Both were very good and made with very fresh fish. One of the best Rainbow Rolls I’ve had in awhile. My boyfriend ordered a couple of Veggie Rolls, Miso Soup and Edamame. He appeared to like his food as well and happily ate most of it.
Service here was good and the server was, for the most part, on top of his game. He did forget my Iced Tea, which wasn’t a big deal as he didn’t charge us for one and once I realized he never brought it out, we were almost done eating anyway, so I didn’t remind him. Prices here were on par with other sushi places in the area. We came here around 6pm on a Tuesday night, and they were pretty much dead with only one other couple in the restaurant when we were there.
I would come back to Sakae Sushi again in the future!
Cheers!

So far so good. Always been wanting to come here and yay!
Sexy roll — SO GOOD! love the fact that there’s no rice. Super stuffed with spicy tuna and topped with fresh salmon, jalapeño and the bottom is a slice of cucumber, covered in garlic ponzu sauce. Really good.
007 Roll — baked lobster with white fish and spicy albacore. Yummy too. Lots of flavor.
Newport beach roll — seared salmon topped with onions, shrimp tempura and crabmeat with avocado. It’s good. Nothing crazy. But its apparently the local favorite.
Small joint. So make sure you’re prepared for that, but I love hole in the wall restaurants. Makes it a fun enviornment :)