Café Zaiya

Just like a Seven Eleven in Tokyo after the subway closes!!! Had onigiri (salmon) and a gyu donburi and while I might have had better onigiri the donburi was great. There’s a microwave to heat it up or you can take it with you for later. That’s all I had though there was a lot more to choose form (Japanese desserts were never my thing so didn’t go for those). Omitted the 5^th star because the seating is so limited and people park themselves there to read things and not really eat, but nice to find and affordable too.

After seeing the reviews I was excited to be stopping by here and grabbing some desserts — I was so disappointed! There is a decent number of seating, but the place is old and the leather on the seats are cracking and color is fading away. But these things don’t phase me, so I go up and order what seemed to be a pretty appealing matcha roll cake — the filling was green-​ish with red beans on the inside, unlike the white cream shown in the match roll in the front of the fridge. Fine — looks decent. I proceeded to eat. The filling was unbearably sweet and creamy. To be honest, the filling was not fluffy like I expected, but it was fairly solid — it tasted like a chunk of sweet matcha butter stuck inside a roll cake. Horrible. The only thing I ate was the cake around it. The mediocre food, along with the lack of maintenance of café made it a pretty meh experience.

Cute little café located on the second floor of the Kinokuniya Bookstore. They have all kinds of affordable Japanese meals, and I’ve come my fair share of times to pick up a little bento for lunch!

Neat little hideaway on the second floor of the Japanese book shop. Picked up some onigiri and a package of sushi roll, grand total was under $ 15. A gem for people who work in the area and need an escape from the greasy joints all around. A relatively healthy lunch that’s tasty. I didn’t try the tea – maybe next time.

i hate giving 3 stars for such a cute place, but I’ve had their lunch boxes here and although the place is more spacious than sunrise next door it didn’t taste as good and portions weren’t as good. there is a huge selection and you will find things you want to try and plenty of seating.

they’re good for when you need a fast bite of japanese convenience store foods. very small and packed. dont have the items on the other zaiya menu… i was a lil bummed but the curry katsu hit the spot since i hadnt been to NY in a while. miso soup was prettty good! a nice stop by spot i would say. dont expect to be wow’ed.

Café Zaiya is great for ballers on a budget. I came here for lunch today and bought a spicy tuna onigiri and a small sandwich ‘platter’ (1/3’s of of egg salad, tuna salad, and ham sandwiches) for a little over $ 6. This location on the second floor of the Kinokuniya Bookstore isn’t as expansive as their location by the NY Library, but it’s good to come here for the essentials

The food is inexpensive with Japanese pastries you have difficult finding elsewhere. However, they can taste better as what we tried so far. Their vegan options are the pickled plum rice balls and kombu tofu rice balls. They were OK (pickled plum incredibly sour), but I tasted better vegan rice balls. The rice balls also had very little filling – most is just rice.
My fiancée loved the chocolate cornet – that was probably the only pastry she enjoyed the most. I will probably only go back here to purchase the chocolate cornet for her.
The eating area is also very small – very packed during lunch hour. If you need to use the rest room, there is one on the main floor.

Bought sandwitch and nigiri.
The spicy tuna nigiri barely had any tuna inside. Was mostly rice. Sandwitch was passable.
Overall selection very poor. Regretted not going to the actual store just a block away.

This place is a cute little spot located on the second floor of a building on 6^th Ave. I had cakes here and perused the books, manga, and graphic novels sections next door. I can see myself sitting here and reading for hours. I think I might just do that :) great find. The view is amazing here in front of Bryant Park.

I had an onigiri craving, so i stopped by and picked up 3 salmon, 2 tuna with mayo, and 1 spicy cod roe.
All were DELICIOUS. Really enjoyed the spicy cod roe!
+ i also purchased a chocolate cornet (sp?) and the milk bread. YUMMYYYY
the milk bread was like a little baguette with cream. so good.
can’t wait to go back! preferably with more $ so i’m able to buy books i don’t need (but want) and all the super cute stuffed things they have downstairs LOL

All I need was one good cup of coffee! Americano tastes like hot water! Very bad!!!
The space was actually cute, in a bookstore, over looking Bryant park. the café can be made a lot better! I see potential. I won’t come back here for sure! Very disappointed

I looooove cute bookstores and enjoy visiting them in every new city I go to. Even though I’ve been to NYC many times, I was pleased to find this cute little Asian bookstore (Kinokuniya) near Bryant park. I wish I could have spent more time in the bookstore checking out the cute Asian stationery in the basement, but I’m glad I spent some time to visit the café inside. This café is simple, small, but full of variety. You can get teas, coffee, bottled Ito En teas, sandwiches, cakes, and other Asian pastries all for decent prices. Nothing too special but I was pleasantly surprised by the variety and quality for being a bookstore café.

Ok. I was here last week when I tried to find a place where hot meals were available. I went all the way from the front to the back of the library, and finally settled down with this place because my shoes were killing me. Fortunately I saw it some where that this place is associate with a book store, otherwise I would never find it.
The café locates on the second floor of a japanese bookstore. The whole place is small. They have a refrigerator and couple microwaves. Basically the only way you can get a meal here is to select from the refrigerator, pay, and microwave them. Not exactly what I had in mind.
They have fried pork rice, curry, beef rice, sushi, Japanese style bread (red bean mellon and so on). They can make tea for you, from a tea bag. They do have coffee. Thank god they take cash. Chairs are not exactly comfortable.
I do like café, but microwave foods are not acceptable for me.

Relatively cheap foods for a café in midtown area. I came in around 5 and was sad to see that there was only 1 riceball left, but I’ll be back to try the other onigiri with more substantial filling than seaweed :3. I had a latte here, as well as a melon bread, teriyaki chicken rice bowl, and matcha steamed muffin. The latte had a nice amount of foam to it, and the melon bread can’t quite compare to an Asian bakery’s pineapple bread (as well as its price). I really enjoyed the chicken teriyaki bowl as I heated up at work and tasted the nice flavors of the bowl mesh together. There was spicy mayo, seaweed, and Japanese rice in a bowl that contains more than it looks!
For a café, it should have free wifi, but the cute Japanese book store compensated for its lack of free internet.

The café could use a little TLC or small remodel especially being housed in a large chain bookstore. Regardless, it was full of delightful treats and Japanese comfort food.
Don’t go here if you are thinking «café» in a Nordstrom’s with glassware and table service. It’s counter service, quick bites, with some fancy sweets tossed in. If you’re someone who’s missing Japanese quick grab food and don’t live near a Sunrise Mart, you can get your fix here.

Yummy bento box. I had the salmon one and it was very tasty and filling! Limited seating but I was able to grab a spot. A nice place to enjoy lunch for the right price.

Don’t get this mistaken with the other Café Zaiyas that exist in the city. This one is situated on the top floor of a bookstore. If you sit by the windows, you will have a decent view of Bryant Park. The seating area isn’t that impressive, and it is small. The food that is offered is alright. I believe there’s a minimum for card, so be sure to bring cash. I probably won’t come back here again, because I think there are better options around the area. Don’t be surprised if most of their sandwich stock is gone by the time you go, I think those sell fast.

Every time I go to Kino, I want to try this place, but the lines are so long. Luckily it wasn’t this time.
I wanted to get a mochi donut, but they were out:(also they have a $ 10 minimum for credit card users, so I browsed around for something else. I eventually got a chicken teriyaki don, yakimochi, spicy salmon onigiri, and a small hot chocolate and the total came to around $ 15.
The yakimochi was pretty good, I liked how chewy it was and red bean is always delicious lol
The spicy salmon onigiri could have been better, it lacked any spicy. I think spam would have been a better filling
The chicken teriyaki don was nothing special. Chicken teriyaki with spicy mayo on some rice and seaweed and a few broccoli and greens.
The hot chocolate tastes like dark chocolate rather than milk chocolate and watery

I visited based on recommendations from Unilocal and the close proximity to where I was staying. This bakery location was upstairs on the second floor of Kinokuniya Bookstore.
I like Japanese breads and pastries, though there’s not much of it when I live. Here, the dorayaki was fine, though a little bit dry and bland. There was a good amount of red bean. The breads (white loaf and others) were quite fresh and weren’t all that expensive. For the most part, all the breads and pastries looked attractive and I wish I could’ve tried them all.
The view of Bryant Park is lovely and if I were in the area, I’d come here to do some remote work. Service was polite and patient.

Yakimoshi! Nom nom nom.