Every April, I get to pick a restaurant off my food bookmarks to have our family birthday dinner. There are a lot of restaurants on the bookmarks list, so it was hard to narrow it down. Inevitably, I always end up picking a Japanese restaurant because it’s my favorite cuisine. There’s just so much variety!  This year, I picked Nonono, a Japanese small plate’s restaurant that is known for their yakitori.

I love that their entire menu is a picture menu. It really helped to be able to see visually what we were ordering. We started off with drinks – I had their Daikon, with radish, yuzu, and plum wine. My sister had the Basil, with strawberry and shochu.

We ordered a bunch – and I mean a bunch – of dishes to share.

First to arrive was a tasting plate with their 3 specials of the day: Scallop with spicy cod roe, Tuna Norimaki with ground tuna in nori seaweed, and Spanish mackerel with vinegrated miso. The tasting cost $9 for a sample of all 3 dishes.

Chicken Meatball Yakitori ($4) and Short Rib with Onions Yakitori ($5)

Nori Tofu, tofu with avocado and nori seaweed paste ($6)

Salmon Tataki, seared salmon with avocado sauce ($11)

Ichigo Salad, mixed green salad with strawberry dressing ($8)

Scallop Uni Carpaccio, scallop uni carpaccio with nori seaweed, basil sauce, and sea salt ($15)

Chawan Mushi with snow crab, salmon roe, and uni ($8 + $5)

Daichi Mushroom, deep-fried grilled mushrooms with scallop basil sauce ($8)

Nanchatte Steak, beef rib-eye with signature onion sauce ($14)

Ika Meshi, squid stuffed with seasoned sushi rice ($13)

Everything tasted amazing (with the exception of perhaps the tofu). My favorite dishes were definitely the short rib yakitori, daichi mushroom, ika meshi, and the nanchatte steak. The steak was very tender and flavorful. The short rib yakitori was succulent and fatty. The daichi mushroom was very unique and I really enjoyed the scallop surprise in the middle.

My mom had told them it was my birthday while I was in the restroom. They sent over their signature dessert, the Suishingen, which is a rain drop pudding with soy bean powder and kuromitsu sauce. This was complimentary and really appreciated.

We opted to order another dessert, the Kuro Goma, which featured black sesame panna cotta with ice cream ($7). This was really tasty – I love anything black sesame, so it really hit the spot.

Service was friendly and very attentive. As our dishes were coming in, they were very patient with us and tried to not interrupt our photo shoot. We were never rushed to leave and our water glasses were always refilled. Everyone we encountered at Nonono was very nice. Service was A+, top-notch.