I love Maneki, as do many of my friends who come over from Japan. It has traditional Japanese food, but also has several dishes that fuse the Pacific Northwest seafood and flavors with traditional Japanese. The only two downsides I can say about the place is that in the last 2 or 3 years it is getting way too popular: the wait list has grown to making it impractical to go to unless you made reservations. The other downside is that I used to go in and see that the majority of customers were Japanese, and the server spoke very little English. Because of its increased popularity outside of the Japanese community, we are seeing less Japanese patrons and the waitresses are nissei and sansei (very Americanized Japanese).
Pros: Great food, feels like an izakaya
Cons: it is becoming too popular
more