The Solo Scale:

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It’s generally accepted that the three finest dining experiences at Walt Disney World are Victoria & Albert’s, Monsieur Paul, and Takumi Tei. In the last few years, I’ve been lucky enough to have the means and get the reservations to dine at all of them. Check out this post for some thoughts about which you should pick if you can only choose one. However, if you’re curious about Takumi Tei, then read on.

I visited in early 2025. Since Takumi Tei operates with an omakase menu (chef’s choice), the menu may differ when you visit. Overall, some of the key aspects won’t change and while flavours and ingredients may shift, the spirit of the meal will remain the same.

When it’s time for you to dine, you’ll find the restaurant in the Japan pavilion on the way out of the country (heading towards Morocco).

You’ll check in outside with a hostess who will introduce you to the concept. They go out of their way to make sure you understand that you’re going to be enjoying an omakase meal. My suspicion is that people mistake Teppan Edo for Takumi Tei only to get sticker shock at the price. In advance of dining, I also got another warning. This came in the form of an extremely long email two days prior to my reservation. It was approximately two pages of warnings, instructions, and notes.

If you’re like me and you booked this on purpose, you can confidently head in!

Once inside, your table will be in one of the five room options. If you want to be in the water room, there is an extra charge. When I went, I was in the wood room, with just one other table seated for the duration of my meal. The room had several decorations that included plenty of wood grain.

You’ll be quickly greeted by your server, who will be extremely attentive throughout the service. In every regard and every moment, the service here was an eleven out of ten. The Japanese culture is predisposed to respect. Add in a layer of finer dining and it feels amped to a hundred. I consider myself fairly polite and there were times that I had to amp my own politeness levels up to match my server’s energy.

Your menu for Takumi Tei will contain your options for the evening. You can choose the “Kiku” or the “Hasu” (which is the vegetarian version). Both of these menus are seven courses and start at $250 before tax. Drinks are not included, but there are many sake and alcoholic drink options. There is both a sake and a wine pairing to go with your meal if you want, but as I was heading off to an After Hours event right after this, I opted to instead go a la carte with my drinks.

If portion size worries you, Takumi Tei now offers a “semi” course of both the Kiku and Hasu. These give yousmaller portions and a few less plates. This starts at $150 before tax.

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The Drinks

I began my meal with a Sakura Jima, a Japanese whiskey drink served in a smoky box and revealed at the table. Fair warning, if you get this, try not to breathe in while it’s being unveiled. I had a bit of an embarrassing coughing fit that lingered for quite a while.

This was smoked with cherry bark and had a nice light flavour, but definitely wasn’t light on the whiskey. It brought a sting to my eyes with every sip. The nice little additional touch was the use of grey granite ice cubes in the drink which preserved the strength of the whiskey and prevented it from being watered down like a traditional ice cube.

As you make your menu selection, you can also get table water. I opted for a bottle of sparkling water, which was an extra cost. However, as I wasn’t doing the wine/sake pairing, it felt like a good substitute. Later in the meal, I decided it was time to try some sake. There’s a very expansive menu and I asked for some suggestions as someone who doesn’t drink sake regularly.

They recommended one of the Dassai sakes. I selected the Dassai 39 which was a bit lighter and not as strong, but was still fairly dominant in terms of alcoholic flavours which did overwhelm a few of the lighter dishes.

In a show of kindness and generosity, the waitress overpoured the sake into the waiting square wooden cup below. This is fairly traditional nowadays at most Japanese restaurants, but it’s still a very nice gesture. When you’ve finished with the sake in the cup, you’ll transfer the additional sake from the wooden box into the cup to keep on sipping.

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The Food

For each of the courses, the description and review will be first, followed by the picture of the item.

The first course begins with several lighter bites. In January 2025, these included: Miso soup served with tempura tofu with a little bit of a spicy kick from the wasabi, tofu in a floral broth made of rice wine and topped with uni and scallop, and a piece of sushi that included eel, egg, and nori. The server brought this with a cloche on top, revealing the meal with panache. Nothing here was a standout, but it was a good introduction course to the meal.

For the second course, we head into the sashimi dish. Here, the options included winter eel, bluefin tuna, striped jack and is served with soy cubes, daikon, and potato. From this dish, the eel was buttery and delicious and the soy cubes were a truly unique way of getting soy sauce in a dish in a more elevated way. It’s something I’d love to see more at restaurants near me!

The third course returns to a variety of dishes in small bites. There wasn’t a unifying flavour for these which did make it a little dissonant. The seven small bites included:

• Salmon with egg yolks
• black pepper on root veg
• Spanish mackerel
• Yuzu on daikon
• Miso cream cheese cracker
• daikon carrot and salmon roe.
• An eggplant dish with some fish eggs atop. This had great flavour and wound up being my favourite despite me not liking eggplant that much

For the fourth course, we started to venture into the hot dishes. Unfortunately, this first hot dish was a little underwhelming. While the broth was delicious, the fish was overly breaded. As a result, it felt a little like fish sticks. The nori on top was a nice touch and the brussels sprouts wound up being a great highlight of this dish. Unfortunately, the fish was a main component and hard to overlook.

Luckily, the fifth course redeemed the hot dishes. The dish was a wagyu tempura accompanied by vegetables. Not only was the breading better, but the lightly fried spinach on top was a revelation and the sesame tofu was a great addition to this dish. When it arrived, the aroma was out of this world.

The sixth course goes a little lighter. Now, we moved into sushi alongside a pickled cabbage and red miso soup. For the sushi, it was two pieces of wagyu and then a bluefin with daikon and shiso. The wagyu was phenomenal and made me sad there was only one piece. As for the soup, the server warned me that red miso is a much saltier variation and that held true. If you are getting red miso, make sure that you’re drinking lots of water after. I wound up feeling thirsty from this for a couple hours after my dinner.

With that course finished, the seventh course brings you into dessert. There’s only one dessert served alongside a green tea. For dessert, I had a custard-style pudding with molasses on top. Unfortunately, the molasses really overpowered all the other flavours and left me feeling wanting. The green tea was fantastic to experience the service — and receive four scoops in the tea. It did get pretty thick by the end, but the green tea flavour was fantastic.

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Overall Thoughts

Overall, the experience was all about the service. There were a few standouts when it came to the food (golden eel, wagyu sushi, winter eel sashimi), but in general, it felt like I could get it at other places. There was also an over-reliance on certain ingredients like daikon, so if you weren’t a fan, you might be disappointed when it keeps popping up.

In my opinion, it’s worth visiting Takumi Tei once if you want to truly experience service on a level you’ve never experienced before and try out some unique dishes. I doubt I’ll be going back to try it again, but I don’t regret going! The price is a bit hefty, but you get a good amount of food for what you pay. Plus, the service truly is exceptional and likely unlike anything you’ve experienced before.

If you want to explore Takumi Tei’s latest menu, you can visit the site here!

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