Akai Hana

We visited Akai Hana during one of our frequent visits to the Kenny Centre. The food is excellent and clearly authentic. What makes it special is the surrounding area—between the restaurant, the market, and the bakery, it’s the best spot in Columbus for anyone who truly appreciates Japanese culture and cuisine. It feels like a genuine community hub.

First time coming here! Got recommended by many friends and I’ve always went to sushi ten. But then the lady behind the counter told us to try their actual location. And did not know it was literally around the corner! Booked a reservation last night at 7:30pm. Server Mayumi was very nice. Helped with all questions we had. We wanted to have sake to celebrate an early bday celebration. The selection of sake was nice and she helped to pick out 2. And suggested a good seafood soup. Had many sushi nigiri. All fresh and superb. The atmosphere was very nice as well. Have no complaint and had a very good experience here. Will definitely come back here again soon!

It was a phenomenal experience. This is legit authentic Japanese food. If you do not like to adventure or go out of your comfort zone with food…then this is not for you. We came on a Monday evening for dinner and the restaurant was pretty crowded, more than normal what you would expect on a week day. We had no wait and they sat us down right away and our server was ON TOP of it. She was absolutely amazing and she went by the name “Sarah”.

My family has been coming here for over twenty years and I would say that I would give Akai-Hana 4.5 to 5 stars most every visit but our visit tonight I would have to say was 4 stars across the board at best. The Soba was good except the shrimp tempura came out cold. The Kalbi was not as good as usual nor the shrimp and vegetable tempura. The chu toro was excellent and probably the best thing tonight. The scallop, yellow tail, big shrimp were all good, but the king salmon was so-so. Uni sold out before we got there. Was hoping to end with a nice dessert but the only thing they had was red bean mochi. I would probably give this more like 3 - 3.5 stars for tonight but want to emphasize that 90% of the time we go here, it’s 4.5 - 5 stars. Hoping this is just an outlier (very busy Saturday n

Voted the best sushi in Columbus year after year for a reason. Impeccable selection of sushi, Korean dishes, appetizers, saki, and much more. The service is also much more involved than similar style restaurants in the greater Columbus area. Several suggestions were made based on taste preferences and the overall experience was just 5 stars as a whole. The place was absolutely packed on a Tuesday night so that says a lot! Also by far the best fatty tuna I’ve had in Columbus by far. Can’t wait to return many times over!