SET Steak & Sushi

Loved this experience dining here! Date night with the hubs in Newport Beach~ we sat at the bar with Brandon and had a blast! Would absolutely recommend him as a bartender the drinks and recommendations were phenomenal. Overall 10/10 experience.

The service and ambiance of the restaurant are amazing! However, for sushi, it's next to average. I've gone to both high end, and mom & pop sushi places, yet felt this was very underwhelming. The flavor combination of the rolls didn't really go well together, especially in hand with the bitter pickled ginger. We also dealt with an insanely strong fish smell inside the restaurant the whole time we were seated. It was quite unpleasant and my husband and I really didn't enjoy that. I feel I've had better experiences food and ambiance wise at Sushi Roku, Nobu, Sea Butter, etc. Fortunately, the service we got was exceptional! Also note that even with parking validation and you valet, it's $15.

5 stars for everything. I chose this restaurant for my Valentines dinner because it has a beautiful garden dining area. Staffs were very friendly. I ordered Lamp Lollipops, Baked Scallops Dynamite, Spicy Grilled Octopus, and Tomato Burrata salad. Everything was amazing. My Valentines dinner was perfect with no complaint. Thank you.

This is a brand new high end steak and seadfood restaurant in the new Pendry Hotel in Newport Beach. Pendry is the new Island Hotel and they seem to have spend quite a bit upgrading the decor and the ambiance of the hotel. Upon arrival, you will find that unlike Island Hotel, Pendry does not offer self parking and your only option is to Valet. Valet is $30, but with validation from front desk, the price drops to $15.
You have to walk past the hip and trendy lobby bar to get the the SET restaurant. Inside is dark but chick, and the outside where we were seated is very pretty with about 25 Serena and Lilly lights hanging off of 3-4 expansive trees, making the outside very nice during the night. So I recommend you ask for outside seeing if you are going to this place at night. They have a nice cocktail menu with all cocktails priced at $19, and beers at $9. There is a $4 up charge if you change the brand of alcohol in the coktail.
Lots of great appetizers on the menu. We tried the tuna pizza, which was delish, the grilled octopus, which was also great but there were way more potatoes that octopus on the plate, the caesar salad with the gigantic croutons and the tomato and burrata salad, both of which were average. We also tried two of their sushi rolls, inlcuding the toro toro toro. They are $19 each and very good. Afterwards, we wished we had only ordered sushi rolls there. For mains, we had their bone-in NY steak with Bernaise sauce (which is $9 add). The steak as cooked to perfection and very tender. We also had the pasta alla vodka, the side of mushrooms that came with a raw egg on the top, and their steak fried rice, which came in a hot pot but was kind of disappointing. Overall the food is a solid 4.5, although a little pricey for what you get. The ambiance is a solid 5 star, which is expected for this high end hotel right by Fashion Island. The most disappointing element of the experience was the service. Although our server was super nice and friendly, and so was the host that sat us down. The service was super slow. We had to wait a boot 15-20 mins for our initial drinks to arrive and then another 20 mins for our second cocktails which ended up arriaving AFTER we got the main meal delivered, so instead of having win with my Steak, I was drinking my $19 Negroni with my steak!. They also refilled our water just once during our whole stay there. On the plus side, they brought some sort of a mango icecream cake for a birthday celeb at the table, and everyone seemed to enjoy it very much. So all in all, food is good except a bit over priced, ambiance is great if you sit outside, service is definitely not 5 star...