SACRAMENTO, CA–Mikuni Restaurant Group will celebrate 25 years in business in the greater Sacramento area. To commemorate this milestone, Mikuni has launched a series of contests and promotions, highlighted by a Honda Fit giveaway in partnership with AutoWest Honda. The winner of the car will be announced in May at the Second Annual Mikuni Japanese Street Festival hosted by Mikuni Kaizen, the group’s newest restaurant located in The Fountains at Roseville.
“We are so incredibly grateful to our guests for giving us the opportunity to serve them over the years,” states Haru Sakata, Mikuni CEO. “We want to be able to celebrate with everyone who helped us get here, and we hope these promotions and prizes will show our loyal patrons how much we appreciate them. This will be a year of celebration and community outreach.”
The schedule of Mikuni 25th Anniversary events includes:
January
- A chance to win a trip for two to Las Vegas, including airfare, accommodations for two nights, and dinner with Taro Arai, master sushi chef
- The start of the Mikuni Honda Fit Giveaway and selection of the first finalist
- The premier of the Mikuni 25 Sushi Roll– panko shrimp, crab salad, and albacore tuna, topped with a special sauce, then torched and garnished with unagi sauce and crunchy tempura bits–available for only $10
February
- Introduction of the limited edition, 25th anniversary, Mikuni-labeled Cabernet Sauvignon. The wine, paired with a copy of Taro Arai’s memoir/cookbook, Abundance: Finding the American Dream in a Japanese Kitchen, can be purchased for $50, a 50 percent savings off the retail price of both items. Only 600 bottles are available, and each is signed and numbered.
- A chance to win an in-home, personal-chef experience for ten people with Taro Arai
- Selection of the second Mikuni Honda Fit Giveaway finalist
March
- A chance to win tickets to the Mikuni Sushi Chef & Server Showdown in May at Mikuni Kaizen in Roseville by voting for your favorite sushi chef and server
- Selection of the third Mikuni Honda Fit Giveaway finalist
April
- The ‘Rolling Back the Prices to 1987’ event at all restaurant locations, featuring savings on select menu favorites
- Selection of the fourth Mikuni Honda Fit Giveaway finalist
May
- Mikuni Second Annual Japanese Street Festival in The Fountains at Roseville
- Mikuni Sushi Chef & Server Showdown at Mikuni Kaizen
- Selection of the fifth Mikuni Honda Fit Giveaway finalist
- Mikuni Honda Fit giveaway
25-Year Snapshot
In 1987, the Arai family opened the first Mikuni restaurant in Fair Oaks, California. Rev. and Mrs. Arai prepared food in the kitchen, while the three Arai children–Kotaro, Naomichi, and Keiko– worked in the restaurant as a greeter, busser, and server. The family struggled but persevered, and in 1998, Mikuni received the first of many awards for best Japanese restaurant and sushi in the Sacramento region. A year later, the family opened a second location in Roseville and launched a website to promote their business.
The creativity of the menu and the unique approach to dining led to the debut of the Mikuni Sushi Bus in 2001, the world’s only traveling sushi bar on wheels. In 2002, Mikuni introduced Sushiology, an interactive, sushi-making class that has grown to become one of the most popular cooking classes in the region, boasting more than 3,000 participants a year.
In 2003, Mikuni ventured out of the suburbs and opened a cosmopolitan sushi bar in midtown Sacramento. To acknowledge and honor the burgeoning number of guests, the Koki Club loyalty rewards program– which supports more than 60,000 members with special merchandise and services– was introduced in 2004. More restaurants quickly followed: Taro’s in Market Square at Arden Fair in 2005, Elk Grove in 2006, and Mikuni Northstar in the Lake Tahoe region in 2007.
Mikuni has always been an active participant in the communities surrounding its restaurants. In 2007, the Mikuni Charitable Foundation was formed to expand financial support to local community-based charitable organizations. To date, Mikuni Charitable Foundation has donated more than a million dollars in cash, gift cards, and in-kind contributions to a diversity of schools, churches, and civic organizations throughout the Sacramento region.
In 2008, Mikuni opened its first out-of-state restaurant near Denver, Colorado in a regional lifestyle shopping mall. Expansion occurred again in 2009 with the opening of a small restaurant within walking distance of the University of California, Davis campus. In 2011, Mikuni closed the Colorado restaurant and opened Mikuni Kaizen in The Fountains at Roseville.
