ACACIA Modern Japanese Dining

9.5 Highly Recommended

Food  10      Ambience  9      Service  10      Value  9     

Our second time at Acacia and the food and service was superb once again. We love trying new foods and restaurants and the staff were very willing to tell us what all the dishes were. It's been a long time since a chef came out and spoke to us after our meal to ask what we thought. We'll be back with more friends to introduce them to this wonderful gastronomical experience.

Mar 18, 2012 

10 Highly Recommended

Food  10      Ambience  10      Service  10      Value  10     

We have been ther twice and is now my preferred restaurant on the (gastronomically deprived) North Shore!

Feb 04, 2012 

8.5 Highly Recommended

Food  9      Ambience  8      Service  8      Value  9     

I went there with my husband who is really not a big fan of Japanese food. But both of us were totally impressed by the restaurant.

We ordered the 5 course set for two. I fell in love with the entree, prawns with cocktail source, the best source ever! I had the wagu beef as my main. The beef was so tender. The plate looked very beautiful. My husband had the pork, which he thought it was the best pork dish he ever had.

The service was great, staff were friendly and helpful. The shop manager, Adrian, chatted with us and gave us some traditional Japanese plum wine to taste. He was so prefessional and made sure we were happy about our food.

My husband seldomly eats Japanese food and is fussy about foods he eats but he stated Acacia was one of the best good quality food Restaurant in Sydney.

Acacia is a must-go restaurant! Highly recommended. we will definitely be going back there.

Nov 25, 2011 

8 Recommended

Food  8      Ambience  8      Service  9      Value  7     

I had went to Acacia last night with a group of 4 girls and was very pleased with our dinner. We shared the 3 entrees and 3 mains but was too full for dessert. I loved the Kakuni Pork (absolutely delish!) and Prawn Cocktail Gratin (had 2 serves each!). After reading the other reviews I feel a bit taken back because the manager was very professional and all the other customers around us seemed to be enjoying themselves. I would recommend Acacia for a special dinner (that's how I found out about this place. I went there with my partner for our 2 year anniversary) and their lunch sets too!

Nov 25, 2011 

1.8 Not Recommended

Food  1      Ambience  2      Service  3      Value  1     

Absolutely disappointing. I Will. Never comeback again. Doesn't even seem to be professional chef and I cant believe the value of dishes too small and not tasty.

Nov 23, 2011 

8.5 Highly Recommended

Food  9      Ambience  8      Service  9      Value  8     

Just had a lovely dinner at this restaurant for our anniversary as recommended by my friend and colleagues. We had five course meals for each of us. The starting mixed plate was stunning with well balanced flavour and items. Second course was chirashi sushi, I don’t know what else the person below would expect from this as chirashi sushi is supposed to be fresh ingredients on top of the rice; this dish was innovatively designed with creative presentation and ingredients were very fresh as well. The third course was entrée, my hubbie had sashimi which was really fresh as he said and again presented beautifully and I had prawn & softshell crab tempura as suggested by my friend which is a must try as apparently they use different recipe compared with the traditional tempura.

The main was really an adventure for my hubbie as he loves Wagyu beef but he used to have steaks. This restaurant made the Wagyu beef differently with braised method, my hubbie was brave enough to try and he quite enjoyed it, to use his own word “it is quite different but the beef is tender and very tasty”. I had light fried salmon which is my favourite fish, and again it turned out in front of me as a piece of art with good portion.

I actually disagree with the comments below for complaining just one piece of broccoli, as I feel too many things on the plate would ruin the design. It is really a personal preference. I am actually a vegetable lover, that’s why the restaurant has suggested me to have a steamed vegetable as side dish; they’ve honestly told me their main course has minimal vegetables as it is only for presentation purpose. The side steam vegetable was really tasty as it has cooked just right with some Japanese spice powder come with it.

Upon to this point we were already full. But we’d love to enjoy the dessert as well. The coffee jelly with ice-cream and the sticky rice bun had drawn the beautiful full stop for our course adventure. I would say I will definitely come back and introduce it to my friends for its good quality food, friendly service and cosy ambience. It is nice to have this kind of local restaurant with overall good quality. May even think of organizing the work function or Christmas party with them as course menu would be a really good choice.

Nov 15, 2011 

2 Not Recommended

Food  2      Ambience  3      Service  2      Value  1     

I had lunch at this restaurant and will never go back. I ordered the lightly pan fried salmon and wanted it with the sauce on the side and only with a side of steamed vegetables. I was absolutely floored when what appeared in front of me was a piece of salmon with one broccoli flowerette as my steamed vegetables. Yes there was a spoonful of some fried stack on the side, and another tray that had the bowl of rice, a few lettuce leaves etc but that wasn't what I asked for.

I feel ripped off as I ordered 1 piece of salmon and a side of vegetables. Didn't get that but did get charged $28 for it. So $28 for 1 piece of salmon and 1 broccoli flowerette Unbelievable.

Nov 09, 2011 

10 Highly Recommended

Food  10      Ambience  10      Service  10      Value  10     

We went to Acacia on an Ouffer voucher deal, $49 for 3 course for 2. I would highly recommend this restaurant. Fantastic service, relaxing atmosphere and perfectly balanced food. Actually I dined somewhere else the night before and I felt that Acacia was far better in terms of the presentation value and the way they balanced the flavours perfectly.

You know when you can tell a chef is really trying hard but in this case, all that effort does not go to waste. I will definitely go again and recommend to anyone. From a 3 course dinner you won't go away feeling full or as if you've overeaten, you'll feel content. The portion sizes are not big but adequate and I feel the quality for the price matches well.

Response from Management:
Dear Customer,

We truly appreciate your fair comments and generous rating. We noticed we used to have portion issue but since we have improved this area, most of the customers are as happy as you are. Also we were truly trying very hard to keep the consistency of the food and service quality which most of our regular customers are aware.

We especially thanks for your generous rating, we believe we still have a lot of room to improve in each area, but your generous rating has done us a great favour to uplift our image as we were struggling with Eatability's rating methodology.

As back in Feb this year there was a very negative review on our food and value from a customer who has a lot of review records; Eatability apparently assume this customer's opinion represents the most of the customers, therefore the overweighting of his rating has dragged our food and value area down dramatically even most of the customers are happy with these two areas. We've been contacting Eatability in regards to this issue but they still haven’t come up with the positive solution.

Anyway we won't take your complements for granted as they are the encouragements for us to keep doing what we are doing for our customers.

Please do let us know whenever you visit, as we would like to keep receiving the feedback from valued customer so as to keep improving ACACIA's overall quality.

Kind regards from ACACIA.

Sep 12, 2011 

7 Recommended

Food  8      Ambience  7      Service  7      Value  6     

I came to this place about 2 weeks ago, and the food is how to say, reasonable, as below the proportions are just a tad to little, but if it were slightly bigger then it would be great value, there sashimi looked fresh and tasted great. I will most likely be back again.

Aug 12, 2011 

7.8 Recommended

Food  8      Ambience  8      Service  8      Value  7     

Don't expect sashimi/sushi as this is a fusion restaurant. It's very modern, food is nice, but portion is small even with the consideration of we're using voucher offer. Will not order (too expensive) if I have to pay full meal. Having said that, just notice that they do not traditional menu during lunch and those price are reasonable, so would want to try again. It should be a good restaurant if the portion can just be a little bigger.

Jul 26, 2011