Mixing food and entertainment can quite often mean dinner on a tray in front of the TV watching ‘Come Dine With Me’, however, Ginza Japanese restaurant brings a whole new experience to dining.

This is no ordinary dining experience. What Ginza does is bring authentic Japanese Teppanyaki right to your own door step, well, in this case Mansfield Road in Sherwood, Nottingham and with great transport links from the City its a doddle to get to as well.

Teppanyaki actually means ‘Iron Plate Grilled’ and it is a large iron plate or Teppanyaki table as they call them, that becomes the unique stage for your own experienced chef so we excitedly took our seats for the show. Arranged around the grill we watched as the skilled chef prepared our food using traditional Japanese Methods. There’s a great selection of set meals to appeal to every ones taste to choose from. We decided on the Teppanyaki Deluxe and the Teppanyaki selection both offering a wonderful array of dishes  and tasters of the Japanese cuisine along with value for money. It is a little more pricey than some of your City Centre buffets but you have the benefit of attentive staff and above all  you know the food is fresh as its cooked in front of your very eyes and you get one hell of a show to go with it.

The chef begins by heating the grill with plenty of flames – Don’t try this at home! This is where the fun and the performance begins not only do they cook your food right in front of you but you see a performance which includes them juggling with eggs and catching them in their hat – something I fully intend to try at home. The tables are great for groups looking for a fun evening out, or if you are looking for something a little more intimate there are also side tables set within the large restaurants darkly furnished decor complete with red lanterns where you can simply enjoy the ala carte menu which offers hot and cold appetisers, seafood, meat and vegetarian options whilst you can still view the Teppanyaki table from a safe distance.

We decided to complete the experience and finish our meal with a palate cleansing green tea ice cream and couldn’t resist finishing the evening with warm sake

There are other Japanese restaurants in Nottingham but few in the UK alone that actually offer this style of cooking. We were impressed with this lively restaurant  so as foodies we’ll definitely be going again. Now in the meantime where are those eggs?