1.

I wanted to share with you an experience we recently had at this new place. I have never had a place disappoint me and my friends more than this placed did. We placed a reservation about three weeks ago. Then Friday 09/28 during the day called and confirmed with a lady. All seemed great. Then 8pm my party of 5 showed up and the hostess informed us “you do not have a reservation”. She not only gave us bad news, but also gave us attitude with it. So we kindly explained that we just confirmed today and that the reservation was booked three weeks prior. She basically said “there is nothing I can do”. We asked for a manager who showed up and was very nice and bought a round of drinks at the bar and worked to find us a table. Note the place was busy but not overly busy so they had a few spots open. When we got our table we had to wait a long time for the waiter, then we ordered a bunch of items for us all to share and try. They came out very slow and in such small portions. It was about $20 per plate/item and barely enough to feed one person. Then we had to keep ordering as we were still very hungry. Then the bus boy came by took all the plates and we had to inform him we still were waiting for more items, he stated “I was told to clear the table”, Which he did and we had to get our waiter who all night was like he was avoiding his tables as others tables had to work hard to get for him also. He stood there asking what else we would like and we had to remind him of the missing items, which he had brought out another 20 minutes later. We spent a total of 3 hrs at the place to complete our meal. We left hungry even after ordering multiples of dishes. Final review -Hostess was rude. The service was very poor and very slow; food was good but in portions that were so small even a Hollywood magazine model would ask for more. The atmosphere was ok even though it gets so loud to hear others at your table unless they are right next to you. Highly do not recommend this place to anyone. Cost is high for what you get. If you want great sushi and a great time with a date of friends go to Blowfish on sunset. It is still our #1 place. Side note I am currently following up with Kumo as they have charged my credit card for the fully meal amount four times. This is just another point against this establishment.

2.

Hey Jason, we appreciate the comments, really we do. but you have to choose: do you want it on this Kumo post, or the other. We're not big fans of multiple posts, cutting and pasting the same thing every time we write something about Kumo. That's how they play it on Chowhound, Citysearch and Yelp. But not here. Make the call, and we'll remove one. We want to hear from you, but gotta keep it clean, kid. Thanks.

3.

Keep it listed on this one. Note your site had system issues and that is why the muliti. I do not multi populate for my health. :)

4.

I’ve been involved with KUMO (and its sister restaurant HAMASAKU) from the outset. I was obviously concerned to read the above post from “Jason,” and immediately followed up with the managers at KUMO to try to understand and correct what went wrong that night.

At the outset, I think it’s important to know that I view the honest accounts that are posted on websites such as EaterLA to be valuable - the positive reviews can be a nice pat on the back, and the negative reviews can be a helpful way to learn about and correct problems about which we might otherwise be unaware. So we take the good with the bad and make the best of it.

After reading Jason’s post, we investigated his claims and found that certain things might be accurate. There were a few complaints about the hostess who was working that night, and that problem has since been corrected. In addition, there might have been issues with the reservation system when Jason called to make the reservation. At the time, the restaurant was not open for business and we had just installed the system and were still working out the kinks to get it functioning properly. It is disappointing to learn that we weren’t keeping a backup reservation book at that time, but that problem has also been corrected. Service issues and portion sizes are also issues that we are constantly monitoring and revising to improve everyone’s experience at KUMO.

However, after digging into Jason’s post, we found numerous errors and, disappointingly, some outright falsehoods. The average price of the items ordered by his party was $13, not anywhere close $20; the few items that were $20 or more were larger items that could have been shared by his entire party of five. Jason was not charged for the full price of the meal multiple times or even once; instead, he was charged only once for a portion of it. Further, there is no record of Jason following up with anyone at KUMO about the nonexistent credit card issue or any other aspect of his experience.

As I mentioned above, these blogs can be great for sharing dining experiences – good or bad – but they shouldn’t be treated as a forum to make defamatory statements with impunity, which is sadly the way Jason appears to be treating them. He seems to be going out of his way to damage the restaurant. Not only did he post twice on your website, but he posted a nearly identical review on another site. Sadly, we don’t have a phone number to contact him to discuss his post. If he had followed up with anyone, we would have a phone number (or some other way) to contact him. That said, we would welcome the opportunity to do so.

In the meantime, Jason should reconsider whether it is appropriate to use this forum in the way that he has chosen to use it. Upon further reflection, I hope that Jason will decide to revise his post to retract the defamatory statements he has made.

5.

I just ate at Kumo last week. Sorry Bryce but I have to say my feelings are nearly identical to Jason's. The portions were ridiculously tiny...the wait staff while very friendly (when you actually could get their attention) really did act like they were avoiding all their tables. The wait staff doesn't know the menu and even misdirected and misdescribed a couple of items. Yes, the food was good when we finally got it but the portions were ridiculously small. I get "small plates" but this was taking it a little far...Kumo's take on crispy rice spicy tuna is two tiny pieces for $15!!! I guess that's what I get for ordering an old stand by. Also, while the cut rolls were delish- $25 for a cut roll is unnecessary. We also left hungry and somewhat frustrated that our celebratory birthday dinner was spent trying to get the waiter's attention and splitting pieces of sashimi into tiny corn kernel bites so we could all try the dish.

6.

I just ate at Kumo last week. Sorry Bryce but I have to say my feelings are nearly identical to Jason's. The portions were ridiculously tiny...the wait staff while very friendly (when you actually could get their attention) really did act like they were avoiding all their tables. The wait staff doesn't know the menu and even misdirected and misdescribed a couple of items. Yes, the food was good when we finally got it but the portions were ridiculously small. I get "small plates" but this was taking it a little far...Kumo's take on crispy rice spicy tuna is two tiny pieces for $15!!! I guess that's what I get for ordering an old stand by. Also, while the cut rolls were delish- $25 for a cut roll is unnecessary. We also left hungry and somewhat frustrated that our celebratory birthday dinner was spent trying to get the waiter's attention and splitting pieces of sashimi into tiny corn kernel bites so we could all try the dish.

7.

My wife and I went to Kumo for dinner last night, and like Jason, we have not been this disappointed with a restaurant in several years. The decor was amazing and if Hollywood ever goes back to Japanese-themed films like Black Rain and Rising Sun, Kumo could make some money for location rentals. But if they are relying on the quality of their food to carry them through, I wouldn't put my money on them. The wait staff was friendly, but didn't seem too enthusiastic about what they were serving. We began by ordering every appetizer on the menu, followed by a selection of more traditional sushi and suggestions from our waiter - we really did give this a fair shot. The standard sushi was fine, but the other dishes were plagued with too many mixtures of flavors that it left our pallets confused and our stomachs turned. The only hot sake available was not high grade and the "pizza" dish was downright disgusting that it still makes me cringe when I think of that first bite. I am a foodie who has only made a handful of postings online, usually when I am pleased to share a great find with other foodies. But this experience left us with such a bad taste in our mouths (yes, punned intended) that I had to put this warning out there for other foodies. Look through the window at night to get a glimpse of the great decor, but do yourself a favor and keep walking. As we walked out the door, we commented that we would have been better off at Astro Burger.