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    Izakaya Ju

    3.6 (202 reviews)
    ModerateJapanese, Sushi Bars
    Closed 12:00 pm - 2:30 PM, 6:00 PM - 10:00 PM

    Izakaya Ju Photos

    Business Info

    IZAKAYA JU ATMOSPHERE

    What's the vibe?
    Casual
    Moderate noise
    Good for groups
    Good for kids

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    Aaron A.

    Wanted to get some authentic yakitori in Markham and found this place. Very simplistic restaurant with lots of seating. It is an izakaya as they serve alcohol, but dosen't open late... Anyhow, service was good and fast. We were the last ones in the restaurant and we weren't rushed out. Tamagoyaki - This is a cold dish. Eggs was cooked well, maybe a tad overcooked. There is a good sweetness to the dish and a bit fluffy. Nice to try. Osaka Chanhan - Like a octopus fried rice. There are tiny octopus bits that add texture to the fried rice. Well seasoned. Fun texture fun flavours would recommend. Would want larger bits of octopus for better texture. Yakitori Combo - Eat this quick as the thin slices get cold quick. I felt that post pieces were very under seasoned. Chicken wings were probably my favourite, but nothing special. Would not get again. Gindara Daikon - A unique way of making black cod so had to try! It felt like the black cod was braised in a sweet oden broth. The fish was super fatty as they used the collar bone of the fish. Very tasty would get again, but beware of bones! Nankotsu Karaage - Fried chicken knuckles! Good texture from the crispy batter, good texture from the crunchy knuckles and well seasoned. Would recommend! Items seems to be a hit or miss. Wouldn't come back again unless friends want to come.

    Skewers combo
    M C.

    Food 3/5 so-so, not as good as before Service 4/5 nice and welcoming Ambiance 4/5 nice and comfortable

    Vegetable combo
    Cynthia Y.

    Cute izakaya that is not loud nor too busy. Relaxing with good service. Nice variety of food items, a bit pricey for the taste. Good quantity.

    Aiko I.

    Check their "today's special" menu. (not available online. Go there and check). Before coming here, I checked their website menu. I was not impressed as it did not have "chicken liver" and "Hatsu - chicken hearts". These two items were the MUST items in regular Japanese yakitori places. But we were there for their Gyu(beef)-tongue and Tsukune (Japanese chicken meatball skewers) - I have been a big fan of these two! When stepping in the restaurant and the menu was given, I was SOOOOOOO pleased to know that they have these two items (hatsu & liver) as "today's special"! The chicken liver (with shio/salt) was cooked perfectly medium-rare. Melty tender with a hint of charcoal. The hatsu was meaty and tender with juicy, springy texture. I recommend these items be eaten simply with Shio (salt). Squeeze a lemon wedges for refreshing aroma. Another recommendation is Motsu-ni (Innards Stew). It has a deep, savory and well-rounded flavor. Each ingredients had a unique texture and I enjoyed every bite of it. Lamb was a bit disappointing. Overcooked. Our Pitcher of Asahi was drunk up so quickly lol. Ice cold - perfect for Yakitori dinner!

    Soft bone karrage
    Anthony F.

    Was a little disappointed by some of the value and one or two misses. The veggie combo was like if chef decided he hated me and selected the worst pieces to cook. While the chicken soft bone karage left much to be desired. The other stuff was good as it was tasty and not overly salty. But everything goes down better with a beer. The location is clean and staff is great. All in all I will probably come back again but will have to be more picky with my orders.

    Yakitori Combo
    Nikki M.

    First came here some years ago and tried chicken heart for the first time. I enjoyed it so much! I came back recently but unfortunately they've removed chicken heart from their menu :( My friends and I made a reservation (party of 3) and were seated immediately. This was during COVID times, so only half the restaurant was open and lots of social distancing. We got the yakitori combo, veggie combo, and one of their dons - all of which were delicious! I will say that Izakaya Ju is a little more on the expensive side - the yakitori combo was $20 for 5 skewers, each skewer having roughly 3-5 pieces. Their service is very good, and I look forward to coming back for more yakitori

    Luisa T.

    Izakaya Ju Japanese vibe Authentic quality food Around $36 (with tax) per person This is a great Izakaya, most of the customers here are Japanese, so you will feel a strong Japanese vibe as if you are in Japan. The cheese baked oyster is amazing. I love their yakitori skewers too~ just slightly salty. But overall valuable and yummy.

    Charmaine L.

    Been there many times and they never let you down. Nice service and yummy food. Not the best best but good choice when you want izakaya at uptown.

    Mandy Z.

    Izakaya Ju is one of the most traditional izakaya place located in J town.  Many of the new izakaya restaurant offers more varieties than this place. However, because of the good review of their eel rice, I pick it for dinner tonight.  We ordered mushroom salad, grilled chicken salad, baked mushroom and oyster with cheese, takoyaki, fish cake, eel rice, ramen, sashimi platter for 2, grilled whole mackerel and vanilla ice cream.  Overall, the quality of food is good.  The eel rice is not as stand out and personally i won't come back because of the eel rice.  Sashimi is fresh and cut is thick.  Fish cake is a bit lack of flavor.  The chicken salad has some surprise, reason to say that is I don't expect such a large portion and very good taste at the price point of $12.  Finally the vanilla ice cream with brown syrup is excellent.  Very special to end with this for a dinner.

    Connie H.

    I have a soft spot for this restaurant because I have watched it evolve over the years. I still remember when the owner set up a tiny booth in the winter outside Jtown selling grilled chicken skewers, and he told me he wanted to open a restaurant there. In a few months Izakaya Ju was open and they had a very limited menu with the focus being the Yakitori chicken, but over the years have expanded the menu and real estate to take the adjacent store space too. My favourite item is still the Yakitori don which is only available during lunch. The chicken burger is also amazing! Obviously their speciality is the yakitori, but I have tried almost everything on the menu and every dish is consistently good quality with good presentation. They hire all Japanese servers and so the service is great. It may be a little challenging for some people as their English ability isn't the greatest, but they are more than patient. Their menu may not be as extensive as some other izakayas, but it is a nice cozy spot with reliable quality and service.

    Lim T.

    This place never disappoints me. After coming here for so many years, the food is still really good. Came to J-Town last night to pick up a cake from Green Tea Lounge and decided to have dinner at Ju. It was around 7pm and the place was quite pack with a few empty tables but marked reserved. I totally forgot how busy this place gets but luckily there was 1 table free for the 3 of us. It's great to see that the restaurant is doing so well since they were one of the first Izakaya places in GTA and with all the competition now, they are still able to keep it up. There are definitely more items on their menu now compared to when they first open. Love the yakatori here especially Tsukune (chicken minced meat). Got a few yakatori, Osaka fried rice, Takoyaki and Karaage. We also got a complementary dish of tako wasabi if you follow them on Instagram. The food came really quickly and everything was delicious. If you love Japanese Izakaya, then you must try this place!

    arrived 10 minutes before it opened and there's already a line, was able to get a seat without reservations. Seems really popular especially during the weekends! The food was good, I would give it a 7 - 7.5/10: we had soba which was great, absolutely love that; beef tongue could be thicker but they're good enough! However, the price was higher than expected. Overall i enjoyed the meal! p.s. they didn't have ochazuke :(

    Oyster in mayo and cheese
    Nicholas L.

    I enjoy eating here sometimes and my last visit was no exception. Heading into this place from j town feels very nice with the alley scenery outside. I walk in and am greeted friendly by the host/server. The place was rather busy at the time but no wait time. For me, I enjoy coming to Izakayas for drinks and snacks rather than a full meal, so I had eaten before coming here. But if you did want to grab a meal, the prices are fair. The food took a bit of time to deliver but was very tasty so I'm ok with that. Drinks came out instantly, as expected. They let us sit in with no complaints all the way till closing. All in all very pleasant experience, and highly recommend the oyster in mayo. Yum!

    Chicken wings

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    Taki Japanese Cuisine

    Taki Japanese Cuisine

    4.7
    (31 reviews)
    5.2 km

    Came here with some friends for the omakase special meal…read more Such a lovely overall standard omakase experience and meal. The highlight for me was probably the set of four starter appetizers, they were flavourful, delicately prepared and perfect way to start the meal. I liked the slightly pickled dish with cucumbers the best. We also had sushi prepared with fresh seafood. The rice was probably my favorite compared to other places I've been. It was perfectly seasoned rice, warm and cooked to have just the right texture, not overcooked and not undercooked. The rice held up well when picked up by hand and complemented the flavours of the fish. Finished the meal with a matcha flavored pudding flan type dessert which had deep matcha flavours. If you're a fan of matcha, you'd probably enjoy it too. All in all, the meal was enjoyable, the torched tuna sushi was probably my favorite sushi of the set and my least favorite was the egg/eel, I was expecting a sweet egg at the end so it unexpected.

    Taki is a fine dining Japanese restaurant located in the busy commerical areas of Richmond Hill…read more We recently had lunch here for a special occasion. The restaurant is super quiet and they offer great quality of food with great service, and the price is expensive if you choose to order sukiyaki set (expect $80+ per person). You can choose between sushi sets at different price level or sukiyaki from the menu. This suits the need of our group given some people prefer sushi but some couldn't eat raw food. They also offer a couple of limited appetizer dishes such as tempuras and unagi don. If you booked the sukiyaki table and want to order sushi, you need to call them in advance to notify which sushi sets you want. We tried the sashimi and sushi courses at $55, which included miso soup, 5 pieces of sashimi, 8 pieces of sushi (squid, toros, salmon, scallop etc.), handroll and matcha or black sesame icecream at your choice. The sushi is smaller than average, suitable for small eaters. The course is totally worth the money. I love every piece of sashimi and my favourite sushi include the scallop and the squid. Everything was super fresh. The dessert was also having the perfect sweetness level for me. In addition, we also tried the sukiyaki for two ($110), which includes mushrooms, cabbages, great quality of Angus beef, yummy tofu and udon. Again, all the material was with great quality and super fresh. I especially liked the sweet sukiyaki soup, the tofu and the udon. We also ordered some shareable dishes including chawanmushi, unagi don and cod. Cod was cooked to perfect (soft and flavourful), and unagi don had quite decent portion. It would be better if the unagi could be softer from my personal opinion. Chawanmushi was mediocre. Overall, I strongly recommend this restaurant to fan of Japanese cuisine. It meets different people's needs by offering both cooked and raw food options, and the sushi set definitely has great value for money.

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    Kimono in TAKI
    Kimono in TAKI
    Hokkaido scallop
    Hokkaido scallop
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    Daimaru Shabu Shabu

    Daimaru Shabu Shabu

    4.5
    (534 reviews)
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    This AYCE Japanese hot pot is a staple and always soooo good even after all these years!…read more Daimaru is one of those spots that you find yourself going back to over and over again. They always have innovative new creations to add to the menu seasonally so that you're never feeling bored with the items you get. You no longer order sauces with the wait staff, but instead it's a DIY sauce station. They have their recipes of their signature sauces on the wall for you to make yourself though. Meats are high quality, soup bases are delicious and selection of food items are great. Some stand out items that is new and tried recently: - Golden crunch fish bites - Nagoya style chicken wings - Premium beef chuck - Beef brisket - Sirloin - Snakehead fish - Shrimp - Shrimp paste - Wide cut beef tripe - Crispy tofu skin roll - Baby kelp - Bamboo shoot Can't wait to be back again over and over again!

    Back again after several months. A few things have changed…read more Wagyu option only comes with Wagyu and premium drinks as the special items. In the past there was seafood that was unique to that menu. Looks like there went cheaper as there is less premium seafood. Added the fish bites like gyubee has. You can still get the old dipping sauces if you like them. I love the garlicky soy sauce one and they can give it to you. Otherwise you can just make your own at the station. Overall still good. Love the sukiyaki

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    Seating booth
    Seating booth
    Ice cream
    Ice cream
    Daimaru Shabu Shabu

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    Osaka Sushi Japanese Korean Restaurant

    Osaka Sushi Japanese Korean Restaurant

    3.8
    (471 reviews)
    8.9 km
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    Got their chirashi bowl ($20). It came with standard items: salmon, tuna, butterfish, surf clam,…read moretamago, and I think sea bream (see pic). They tasted very fresh, however they were rather thinly sliced. Came on a Thursday for lunch and it was rather busy. The udon bowl I saw from another table looked quite large, so I might try that next time. Wish their lunch udon set came with a sashimi option. The seating feels quite private, as most of them are partitioned booths. They have a servicing button which is nice. I'm guessing bc it's hard to catch the staff with the way the booths are setup.

    Usually a good staple restaurant in Markham but our most recent visit was a disappointment…read more Food was pretty mediocre. The worst was the beef sashimi which had the gnarliest grey colour (ykno the colour when meat is leftover sitting in the fridge for way too long) and had no sear at all either. Sushi temperature was much too warm and the variety was pretty basic for the 2 person platter. Shrimp tempura was good tho - not too oily and not overcooked. The restaurant was extremely hot inside, the A/C was no where near the right temperature for how hot it's been this summer. It was also extremely noisy inside since the restaurant is relatively small - not really a place for a quiet, lowkey meal.

    Photos
    Osaka Sushi Japanese Korean Restaurant
    Lunch special - Tempura and salmon teriyaki bento box
    Lunch special - Tempura and salmon teriyaki bento box
    Chicken teriyaki dinner (came w/ a bowl of rice and salad)

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    Daimaru Shabu Shabu - Markham

    Daimaru Shabu Shabu - Markham

    4.6
    (119 reviews)
    5.6 km
    $$$

    Went for the weekend lunch with 4 adults and had a pretty good experience. The place was really…read morebusy and there were lots of people waiting, so it's clearly popular. You get 1 hour 45 minutes for lunch and can choose 4 soup bases for free, which was nice. We picked sukiyaki, spicy sour soup, tom yum, and beef tallow broth. The food selection wasn't huge, but it still felt worth it for the price. Service was pretty quick even though the restaurant was packed. My favorite was the sukiyaki with beef dipped in the onsen egg. Really tasty overall.

    Came with a small group and we loved that there was a sauce bar to create your own sauces. They…read morealso had some fruits and snacks available. The menu for dinner is quite robust and everyone was able to find multiple things that they enjoyed. I particularly love the japanese glass noodles. It goes amazingly with the tomato or sukiyaki soup base. I also love that they provided us with a soup skimmer so we could get rid of the oils as we continued to cook. Compared to the Scarborough location, I'd say this one felt calmer even though it was still pretty packed. I think it's just the way the booths are spaced out and it's really well staffed. It wasn't a long wait for anything, and always easy to flag someone down if we needed to order or just needed some help. The parking here though is quite difficult compared to the Scarborough location. Theres a ton of competing restaurants and the lot isn't large enough to accomodate all of them. There's more parking in the underground space though so you can walk through the plaza if you like.

    Photos
    The new sauce station is much better than before
    The new sauce station is much better than before
    Tom yum / Tomato soup base
    Tom yum / Tomato soup base
    This was an option, if you choose

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    This was an option, if you choose
    Sumoki

    Sumoki

    4.0
    (61 reviews)
    6.1 km

    Back again and incredible again…read more Small tip. You don't need to order on only one phone. As long as you scan the bar code, you can order from any phone. Enter either you own info if paying separately or the same info if one person pays all of it. Lots of new dishes as well as old favourites: Chochin: Tried it. Not a fan. Tastes exactly the way I thought it would. Which is internal organ like but in an unpleasant creamy way. Duck liver raspberry toast: Nice but could be bigger. The raspberry brought an expected nice sweetness to the nice liver taste. A little more raspberry would be nice. Tuskune and egg yolk dip: It's ok but not that big a deal. Cheese momo: Fantastic. The swiss cheese is an excellent pairing to the chicken. Skin-Kawa - Delciious. Crispy. Must have, Hiza (knee cartidlidge): nice and crunchy Beef short rubs boneless: Was enticed due to the tendon part. It was nice but not incredible. Beef tenderloin + Chimichurri: Wife's favourite. We always order several of these. P-toro: Another must repeat. Great pork belly taste. Cherry tomato bacon maki: New and delightful. Bacon wrapped cherry tomatoes provide a delightful burst of tomatoey sweetness wrapped with the unctuousness of bacon. Lamb rib chop: Excellent and tasty. Once again everything was cooked perfectly and the amazing binchotan smoke made everything delicious. Fun fact, they put charcoal in the free water carafes as well.

    We visited here for a weekend lunch and the restaurant was packed with people who were enjoying…read moretheir food and the cozy vibes. Sumoki Yakitori offers tasty Japanese-style skewers and small plates. The grilled items are cooked just right--smoky, juicy, and full of flavour. There's a good variety to choose from; chicken, beef and vegetables. We ordered "Age Mochi", "Chicken Oyster", "Momo", "Negima", "Tsukune + Egg Yolk Dip", "Cheese Momo", Hiza (Knee Cartilage)", Beef Tongue", "Beef Tenderloin + Chimichurri", "Garlic Sprout Maki", "Mentaiko Carbonara Udon", "Yaki-Onigiri (2 pcs)", and "Breast w/ Wasabi". Every skewer was fresh and tasty. My favourite was Beef Tenderloin with Chimichurri. We paired our meal with beautiful drinks that hit the spot: "Yamayuzu Matcha" and "Fairy Yuzu". To finish on a sweet note, we ordered "Grilled Mochi (Sweet)" and "Dango", which we enjoyed.

    Photos
    Inside the restaurant
    Inside the restaurant
    Sumoki - matcha beer
    Sumoki - matcha beer
    Sumoki - chicken yakitori including with Tokyo onion

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    Sumoki - chicken yakitori including with Tokyo onion

    Izakaya Ju - japanese - Updated August 2026

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