Japanese teppanyaki style restaurants were first introduced into the United States in the early 1960’s and have become an extremely popular choice for a fun and tasty dining experience. Worcester is no exception as we have seen the teppanyaki-style restaurant growing and at last count Worcester enjoyed Hirosaki Prime, Feng Asian Bistro & Hibachi, Kyoto, Sakura Tokyo and Takara to name a few. In addition to teppanyaki style cooking, these restaurants all offer a full menu including sushi, noodles, tempura and other Japanese favorites.
Teppanyaki style cooking uses a solid iron griddle heated from below and allows for an extremely unique dining experience. Patrons are seated around the grill and watch highly-trained chefs not only prepare their food, but perform a show for his guests while doing so. During the preparation, the chef will interact with customers, juggle utensils, flip shrimp pieces to the patrons to catch in the mouth, toss an egg up in the air and split it with a spatula and create the ever poplar onion ring fire-shooting volcano.
For dishes prepared on the grill, patrons usually choice from steak, chicken, shrimp or lobster and include rice, egg, veggies, sprouts, and more, all prepared right in front of them and accompanied with a variety of sweet and hot sauces. The preparation of the food is quite unique, as the chef slices and dices the meats and seafood on the grill top with expert knife skills while preparing the rice and veggie side dishes in parallel. When the cooking is complete, he serves his guests directly from the grill.
Teppanyaki restaurants offer a unique experience, one that can be enjoyed by everyone. For families, children are amazed at the skills of the chefs and usually enjoy the interaction and the overall show they put on. For couples and small groups of friends, it provides a completely different dining atmosphere, one that combines not only great food but entertainment as well.
