Wished the food was better. The ramen and food at this location were subpar compared to the restaurant in Ho-Ho-Kus, but the experience in general was a bit of a strange one. Finding Tojo Kitchen inside the Garden State Plaza mall isn't too difficult, but it's still located off of the so-called beaten path away from the chaos of the food court. This oddly huge and well spaced out restaurant is only about a few minutes away from the food court, but you'll feel like you're in a completely different section of the mall altogether. Having been to their sister restaurant, Tojo Restaurant, in Ho-Ho-Kus, I was expecting pretty good things here, but the whole experience was off. When we first spotted the restaurant inside of the mall, we couldn't believe how big the space was. At the time we arrived, which was about 5:30pm on a Friday evening, the restaurant was pretty empty with just 2 other parties inside and both about to finish up. However, the 1st thing anyone will notice when they arrive is the amount of SPACE in there. I don't think I have ever seen a more well-spaced restaurant in my life. Well-spaced might not be the word because of the lack of efficiency with the space, but this restaurant is like one huge white cave. And that's just scratching the surface because when you make your way to the bathrooms, you'll stumble upon all of the unused space that is available too, including a giant kitchen. As to who planned the layout of this restaurant, beats me. OK, so once you get over the fact that this mall restaurant is so big, if you've been to the Ho-Ho-Kus location, the menu is an exact replica. They have your usual Japanese appetizers, ramen bowls, rice dishes and they even have a section dedicated just to rice balls. We ended up ordering a few appetizers and a ramen to share. Specifically, we got the Pork Buns, Agedashi Tofu, Karaage, Black Garlic Ramen with Corn with a set Pork Gyoza and a Spam Musubi set of 3 with egg. First, the appetizers (Pork Buns, Agedashi Tofu, Karaage). They were OK. Not great, not terrible. Honestly, can't write much about them other than I guess they are what you would expect, but they could have been hotter. The Black Garlic Ramen was just OK too. It looked a bit blah and didn't come out all that hot. In no way did it knock my socks off, but I've also had worse. As for the Spam Musubi, our kids seemed to like it. I took a quick bite of one of them and didn't think it was all that, however, it was just spam and eggs after all. No big surprise after what I wrote, but the food was just average to below average. Everything definitely could have been better, as in fresher tasting. For such a big space, there was only 1 waiter, who also happened to be the greeter too. And there seemed to be only 1 chef too. As the evening wore on, there were a few more parties that came in and it seemed people did takeout from here too, but it feels like something is just lacking here and there is so much more potential with the space and food. read more