Title: Sept 22, 2013
Author: jean komatsu
Last saved by: ENU

Roka Akor
801 Montgomery @Washington St., San Francisco, CA
http://www.rokaakor.com/locations/san-francisco/menu/sfmenus/ 
Review date: Sept. 2013

Roka Akor opened in London in 2007 to reviews that rated it "average". The first U.S. Roka Akor was opened in 2008 in Scottsdale AZ, where the holding company is located. It's associated with the Yuma restaurant chain, and Roka itself now has four locations in the U.S.: Scottsdale, Chicago, Old Orchard (a suburb north of Chicago), and its newest in San Francisco. 

The blurb for Roka Akor isn't timid: "Like its award-winning London counterpart, Roka Akor restaurant in San Francisco brings the unparalleled combination of thoughtful design and contemporary Robatayaki..."

The executive chef is Roman Petry, who comes to SF with an international resume of Japanese restaurants, all in Europe. The concept is "small plates of sushi, sashimi, and steak." In itself the idea is a bit odd to Asians. Japanese food is pretty much the original "small plates" cooking to begin with! 

If you're wondering precisely what an Arizona corporate restaurant chain knows about great Japanese food...well, that's a really interesting question, now that we've dined here. Especially as Roka's publicity seems more focused on emphasizing the stylish interior décor before it gets around to talking about the food.

As it turns out, the real Achilles heel of Roka isn't the food itself. The ingredients are reasonably good, although more three- to four-star quality, not true five-star. And the décor is nice, although no better than any other new contemporary restaurant. 

No, the true weaknesses of Roka are:

1.	The concept of their plates, which despite the fancy descriptions are essentially simplistic. Soy sauce and ginger with some wasabi, or a sweet hoisin, pretty much describes most of the dishes we tried. With the good but not great quality ingredients, most dishes aren't really that interesting. 

As Carlos put it, "Every ingredient used 'shouts' in every dish. There's no subtlety anywhere, and no evidence of any real technique."

2.	The execution, which too often was sloppy and over the top. Everything looks pretty, and like Saison and their ilk, a good-sized fortune was spent on elaborate, and sometimes awkward, serving dishes. Yet for all that, you get a pair of cheap break-apart wooden chopsticks to use. To add to the ignominy, these are Chinese chopsticks; not even Japanese-style chopsticks. 

Is this supposed to be a charming casual touch? Because it isn't. It just feels dumb and marginally insulting.

3.	The service, which was cheerful but almost frantic, with absolutely no attempt to arrange food into logical courses, or time anything in a gracious manner. It's the restaurant equivalent of "slam, bang, thank you ma'am." Never mind that minimum $150+/pp tab; turn those tables at least once an evening!

My brother James was in town for OracleWorld (we were of course rooting for the stupid Kiwis, who blew the America's Cup. Idiots!). We met him and his wife Yuka at Roka Akor, located in the Jackson Square area. I chose a Sunday, so it would be easier for us to drive in and find parking.

Which it was, but don't ever park on Broadway Ave. According to the resident homeless guy, the meters run 24/7 on that street. On a Sunday evening, we were able to park within half a block without using the restaurant's valet service.

This is a big rectangular open dining room, with the equally open kitchen located in the center rear. Manned by startlingly loud-voiced line chefs (none of whom are Asian, btw), the noise level is ear-splitting. I called ahead of time to ask for a table in a quiet corner, and the hostess was able to accommodate us. It wasn't quiet – there isn't any table that's truly quiet here – but it was slightly less thunderous than the center tables, or the tables nearest the kitchen. There are only three of these off-to-the-side tables: one four-top where we were, and a pair of two-tops sharing an upholstered banquette. Next to them is a glassed-off area where moderate-sized groups can share three long tables. 

James ordered a sochu tasting. He received three: Thai Chile, Plum-Cinnamon, and Ginger. He and Yuka shared the tasting, and I took a sip each from the Chile and the Cinnamon. The Chile was sweet and hot, the plum and the ginger sochus were dry and aromatic. 

The waitress recommended three or four dishes per person. Although Roka Akor's menu looks long, it wasn't easy for us to find twelve dishes we wanted to order. None of us were interested in the Kobe or three Wagyu steak selections, which are as astronomically priced as one would expect.  

The waitress came bythree times to ask if we were ready to order yet. At these prices we wouldn't want to feel rushed or anything, would we?

We eventually chose the following twelve dishes:

Butterfish Tataki. Six triangles of butterfish sashimi were exquisite...or they would have been, if the overpowering soya sauce that was poured over, then topped with an equally overwhelming fine dice of too-old pickled ginger, had allowed us to taste anything. My first bite engendered an instant reaction of, "Oh, it's sashimi for people that don't like raw fish!" A real shame, as butterfish is a lovely fish for sashimi when allowed to stand on its own.

Uni (Sea urchin) with chicharrones. The uni was from Mendocino, and very fresh. Very mild and less salty than some we've tried. The chicharrones, deep-fried pig ear chips, are in small shreds; housemade and very good. There's a grilled lime to squeeze over. It was an interesting combination that would have been intriguing, had not the busser tried to snatch the dish away before we were finished. When one is paying this level of pricing, such amateur service is such a huge faux pas that words failed all four of us. We could only exchange significant looks, and shrug it off.

Soft-shell crab and kimchi maki. First time I've ever liked soft-shell crab. This one actually had meaty legs, and it made a nice sushi roll. Can't say we tasted any kimchi, though. Pleasant but undistinguished.

Rib-eye with Wafu sauce. This is a 12-oz rib-eye, sliced for sharing. It's garnished with toasted sliced garlic chips that might be housemade but could just as easily come from 99 Ranch Market in those big plastic jars, along with a few nondescript baby cilantro leaves on top. The steak had been beautifully grilled – the robata griller is a lovely piece of equipment. But our request for "medium-rare but closer to rare" came more "perilously sliding towards medium". The steak was tender but tasteless. It hadn't been salted prior to grilling. Instead, after grilling it was drowned – and we mean that literally – in a super-salty pond of soya and fresh ginger, that again overwhelmed what it was served with.

Alaska black cod wrapped in Japanese magnolia leaf and served with yuzu dressing. One of their signature dishes, the cod is just a trifle overcooked for our Bay Area preferences, but saved by the high oil content of this fish. The vaunted magnolia leaf curled decoratively over it seems only for show. There was no flavor gained from its oven-shriveled surface. The fish is glazed with a sweet hoisin glaze and sear-roasted. The yuzu mayo would have been great on ice cream, or smeared on a scone. All of us tried one taste and promptly ignored it. All of us liked this dish, but as I remarked, it's hard to make a bad black cod unless you make a deliberate effort to screw it up. 

Tiger prawn with yuzu and ginger. Maybe if you're Michael Bauer (he raved about this dish in his SF Chronicle review) you can get one of these that isn't seriously overcooked. It was massive – easily as large as an average lobster tail. But that harsh raw ginger garnish was the same as on the butterfish tataki, and it was just as overpowering here as it was there. Our prawn was so overcooked it was rubbery. The yuzu was generously drizzled over the diced prawn meat, and as with the butterfish, acrid ginger and citrus was all we could taste. We unanimously agreed this ranked as the most disappointing dish of the night.

Lamb cutlets (misnamed, these are chops from a rack of lamb) with Korean sauce. Grilled mild U.S. lamb, served with a super-hot, hardly sweetened gojuchang. Really makes you realize how sugar-heavy our local Korean restaurants have become! My foodie brother, who lives in Glendale, assures me that LA's Korean food remains savory and chile-hot, just the way it should be, without the overdose of sugar we use here in Northern CA. This was a tasty plate, but outside of the sauce this dish is the same in a thousand restaurants in the Bay Area, and Roka's is no better than anyone else's version. In fact – again – there's dozens of restaurants whose chops are more interesting, because they're seasoned with something, even if it's just salt and pepper.

Sweet corn on the cob with butter and soy sauce. Great way to end the local corn season. Roka quartered the white corn and added a great hit of garlic. Charred on the grill somewhat unevenly, but all four of us loved this veggie. It was light on the soya, a good thing because heavy-handing the soya had already ruined a couple of the previous dishes for us. The butter they used was fabulous; it tasted as if the cream had been slightly ripened prior to churning. 

Japanese mushroom rice claypot. You can't get plain rice at Roka Akor. That would be much too Asian and déclassé. Think of this as a fine mushroom risotto, with creamy glutinous rice and a mix of four mushrooms, in a good mushroom broth. What did you say? You could make this at home even better using porcini and chanterelles? You Scrooge, you! But Roka's version is quite tasty and frankly, one of the few dishes with which you can fill up your stomach. Portions being what they are here, if Carlos and I were by ourselves we'd need one each of these bowls, even though this type of rice is very filling. Each pot is very handsome: a miniature cast-iron kettle with the traditional wooden top, along with a lot of empty space. Even with the brothiness, the four of us received portions of about three tablespoons of rice. Nope, that's not a misprint – less than 1/4 cup of rice each. You can get the same claypot with black truffles for twice the price, but I'm not sure why anyone would.

Pork ribs with spring onions and cashews. Country-style ribs with a sweet hoisin glaze (no surprise; it's clearly the Glaze of Choice here). Tender, nicely cooked although no distinctive flavor except the glaze, which isn't any different than anybody else's hoisin from a can. The cashews were finely chopped and garnished in a big clump, adding nothing. The spring onions were misnamed; it's fall, in case Roka hadn't noticed. These were big rings of old, pungent white onion, not pickled long enough to mellow out the harsh bite of raw onion. Tasty, but the execution failure on the garnishes lessened the concept of the dish.

Vegetable maki with pickled plum (umeboshi) and watercress. This was recommended to James to try. The watercress is properly de-stemmed and tender, so if you like watercress (which we do) it's very tasty with the acidic lift of the umeboshi. There's a very thin slice of takuan and an equally thin slice of kampyo. Roka is not a generous sushi maker so the roll is small. This one was a nice contrast to the other dishes we'd ordered.

Pork belly with diced yellow beets glazed with soya and sugar. Served with both green wasabi and true fresh wasabi, if you ate everything together it was a nice combination. But the kitchen could use anything from turnips to pumpkin to potatoes in place of the beets, and nobody would be able to tell the difference due to the extra heavy sugar and soya used in cooking them. The pork belly was nicely done, and exactly one-quarter the size of Bistro 1491's serving a few weeks ago (and no, it wasn't any better). This was very tasty but once again, just about even or slightly below what a number of other local restaurants do.

Red Sea bream, cured with cherry blossoms, topping two pieces of sushi. Outstanding. The bream was lovely, and the cherry blossom flavor was amazing. This dish was likely worth the $14 they charge, just to try something so distinctive and unusual. Whether you would want to order it a second time is a moot point. Is it your own wallet you have to open, or is this on someone else's dime?

Sweet corn tempura. Four round balls of slightly chewy corn, batter-fried. I felt like it was Old Home Week! My mother used to make these, one of the very few deep-fried items she liked. Carlos loved these even more than the grilled corn. Whether flour, eggs, milk, and parched corn in a fritter smaller than a golf ball is worth almost $2.40 each is again, up to the diner.

We tried four desserts and found overall they were quite good. In fact, the hit ratio was higher for dessert than it was for the savory foods:

Valrhona chocolate lava cake with housemade ice cream and a light chai crème Anglaise. Carlos ordered this but was disappointed. It's sweet dark chocolate and tastes pretty much just like Hershey's syrup. Although it was nicely liquid inside, it was also barely lukewarm in temperature, meaning it was made far in advance which is a big no-no. The chai cream was scant despite the showy tableside pour-over by the waitress, and added little flavor to the dish.

Berry crumble – blueberries, blackberries and red raspberries with housemade ice cream. Although Carlos' dessert was sweet, none of the other three were. Yuka ordered this, and it's the first time I've thought a crushed shortbread cookie crust worked as a topping. The trick is to thoroughly crush the shortbread into very fine crumbs. It's still a little too sweet for my taste – I like the depth that the molasses in brown sugar gives to a crumble topping – but to offset it, the berries weren't sweetened at all. They were quite tart, and so a good contrast to the crumble and the ice cream.

Coconut panna cotta with fresh pineapple. I ordered this, as I'm a panna cotta lover. This was very soft and less rich than the version Montclair Bistro/Oakland makes, but it went beautifully with the unsweetened chopped fresh pineapple and a topping of pineapple foam. A lovely version, and I'd be happy to order this again.

Hokkaido cheesecake with fresh berries and a marshmallow crème topping. Outside of the thin layer of topping being sweet, the cheesecake itself was excellent. Barely sweetened, we spent some time discussing what kind of cream was used. It was definitely a double-cream, but there was almost no taste of ripening or sourness to it. Tall and light, but more like whipped butter-light with a hint of gelatin, as opposed to a thick cream cheese batter with whipped cream or beaten egg whites folded in. The texture seemed solid when you used the fork on it, but it didn't weigh much, and melted ethereally on the tongue. All of us thought this was outstanding, one of the more unique cheesecakes we've ever had.

With his dessert, Carlos had coffee which was weak and undistinguished in flavor. It's in a silver press pot, but we'd suggest leaving it at least six minutes or more before pressing, or you might mistake it for tea.

We can't say the food at Roka Akor is good enough to bring us back. It isn't, no matter what Michael Bauer believes (his review gave it 2.5 stars and is titled "Roka Akor Impresses": http://www.sfgate.com/Roka-Akor-impresses). As Bauer's face is well-known to the restaurant trade, it's quite probable that Roka took some extra care with his food. Frankly, our tiger prawn was huge (one of the dishes Bauer recommends), but there is simply no way it could be cut into a dozen pieces…unless minced! And its overcooking was a sin, pure and simple.

I can see Roka's food being a hit in London. Definitely, a hit in Scottsdale AZ. Maybe even Chicago, although I'm surprised they are willing to support two of them…but there are twelve million people in the Chicago metropolitan area, and a whole lot of them don't eat raw fish.

This chain of not-quite-fusion-but-not-quite-Asian, upscale Japanese food is a hybrid beast, like one of those Dr. Seuss creations with four mismatched legs. It stumbles along after a fashion, and even manages an occasional gallop. But it can't keep the pace up consistently…and then wonders why it keeps falling off the road. 

And yet Roka was strangely compelling in its own way. It's handsome and fun, with a lot of energy. And when a dish hits, like the sea bream or the mushroom hot pot, it's deliciously seductive even as the back of your mind keeps saying, "we're paying how much for two bites?!?" It's hard to decide, because at these prices the service should be much better than it is. Cheerful enthusiasm does not make up for sloppily trained staff.

James thought this was a mismatch for San Francisco, and maybe it is. It's certainly no equal to Sushi-sho/El Cerrito, or the original Kabuto/SF, or any of our better robata or yakitori places. But most of these excellent restaurants aren't geared towards the corporate crowd entertaining out of town visitors, or large groups, or even tourists. Whereas Roka excels in providing the right kind of space and atmosphere for all three, as well as Millennials who are looking for a special dinner night. It has succeeded where Anzu at the Hotel Nikko in SF's Tenderloin/Middle Market area, tried for almost two decades and failed miserably.

Despite the odd missteps, this evening was a lot of fun. We always enjoy being with my brother and his wife. Like us, they love to indulge gastronomically. Whether good, bad, great or awful, it's having the experience that matters. And Roka was a truly interesting experience. This is a restaurant you have to actually try to see if you like it, because you can either forgive them for being Not Really Asian, or you can't.

As Bauer points out, your other option is to order the omakase, which must be for the entire group. But again, there's that element of chance. If everything was as amazing as that bream cured in cherry blossoms, the meal would be worth every shekel. But if half of the dishes were as off-balance as that ginger-soya overdosed butterfish, you might regret that bill instead.

That said, if you planned properly you could have a fine meal at Roka without spending a fortune. Carlos and I would order two of the mushroom-rice hot pots, along with the lamb chops (getting one extra, which brings that dish to the $50 mark for four chops) and two plates of corn fritters. Then we'd share that cheesecake (dessert portions are big) and coffee, which would get us to the $150 mark for two people. For a lively evening out, that's perfectly within reason. Unfortunately, there's also little that would be unique about such a meal.

As it was, our meal with four people of twelve plates, one sochu flight, four desserts, and one beverage, was approximately $498 without tip. Figure with taxes and tip you are hitting the $600 for two couples who mostly drank water.

Was it worth it? For the experience, absolutely. For the food and service...well, how about we leave Roka to Mr. Bauer, and meet you at Etoile in Yountville instead?