A Four-Year Tokyo Sushi Wait Is a November Booking in New York

You can book November at Mitani New York. The counter is inside the Lotte New York Palace, 455 Madison Avenue at 50th Street, and the seats are on Tock. Yasuhiko Mitani opened the original in 2006, six seats in Yotsuya. Eater reported on Oct 20 that a new guest needs an introduction from someone who already eats there, and that the wait runs about four years. Tabelog, which lists that counter as a 2026 Gold winner, says no new reservations are accepted.

Dinner on the restaurant’s site is $700, tip included, tax on top. That is six or seven small plates and 10 to 12 pieces of sushi. Mariage, his pairing of wine, sake, and tea through the meal, brings the check to $1,500. Premium Mariage starts at $2,000, and the site says the number moves with the bottles. Eater describes one of those pairings beginning with a shrimp fried only long enough to leave the center raw, and a glass of 2002 Cristal.

Two rooms, six seats each. The counters are hinoki, a pale Japanese cypress. Kazuya Tsurta, the executive chef, works the cream-colored one, the Oh Room. He spent five years at Kioicho Mitani, Mitani’s 2016 restaurant in Tokyo, and Daichi Shimamiya, another cook from that kitchen, is in New York with him. The other room, Koku, has charcoal-colored walls. When Mitani is in the city, about three times a year, Eater says he works both counters. He told Eater he had wanted New York for five years, a place for the apprentices to cook, and he called it “the most challenging place in the world to do business.”

Eater says the fish is bought at auction in Japan and is on Madison Avenue in under a day, flown from Haneda. For the fatty tuna, Mitani’s own example is 59 degrees on the fish and 68 on the seasoned rice. His other Tokyo rooms take reservations, and the wait is still long. Regulars are about a year out at Kioicho, and about 10 months out at the Bettei, the room he opened beside it in 2021.

The booking, checked on Tock Saturday, asks for $700 a person up front. Bring the card you used, and an ID with the same name. Cancel inside 72 hours and the restaurant keeps the deposit. Seatings are at 5 and at 8, and the restaurant puts the meal at about two and a half hours. In November the site shows the counter closed Tuesday and Wednesday. The note says the hours can change. Lunch is a call to 212-994-9831. Guests are asked to be 12 or older unless the party has the room alone, and payment is the card from the booking.

November is there. On most of those nights, Tsurta is the one across the counter.