The company was founded in 1964 on West 56th Street in New York City for 25 years Hiroaki "Rocky" Aoki.
Aoki, a wrestler who qualified for, but did not attend the Olympic Games in 1960, started the restaurant with $ 10.000 obtained driving an ice cream truck in Harlem. The first restaurant, Benihana of Tokyo, named for the red safflower that is the name of a coffee shop owned by his father in Tokyo.
Aoki is a concept for a food to be prepared in cinemas by a knife wielding, joke-telling chef at a teppanyaki table surrounded by a wooden feeding surface in front of guests (Teppan meaning "steel grill" or "wok "and yaki meaning" grilled "or" roasted "). At first it did not do well until early 1965, when Clementine Paddleford the New York Herald Tribune gave it a favorable review. The Beatles and Muhammad Ali were among the celebrities who then abandoned four tables in the restaurant.
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