RESTAURANT NEWS | NORTH CAROLINA
DŌZO Grew From Food Cart Into One of Charlotte’s Most Interesting Restaurants
DŌZO | MAP | INSTAGRAM
By Eric Barton
6:51 a.m. ET, June 13, 2026
AUTHOR BIO: Eric Barton is editor of The Adventurist and a freelance journalist who has reviewed restaurants for more than two decades. Email him here.
DŌZO started with a food truck, moved into a 12-seat counter, and got popular enough that chefs Perry Saito and John Gamble had to find more room.
Their new restaurant in Charlotte’s Dilworth neighborhood is the third version of an idea that began with Katsu Kart, the food truck that built a following for Japanese sandwiches and comfort food. Saito and Gamble opened the first DŌZO inside a shared Wesley Heights kitchen in 2024, squeezing an open kitchen and a dozen seats into about 600 square feet. Less than a year later, they were already planning the move to East Boulevard.
Saito and Gamble
The larger restaurant keeps the food that made the first location work while giving the chefs more room to wander. Crab fried rice and okonomiyaki remain, joined by smoked blue crab dip with ikura and furikake kettle chips, hot honey karaage, spicy tuna carpaccio, baby back ribs, and a tonkatsu Caesar with shaved Brussels sprouts and yuzu dressing. A5 Wagyu gyudon comes with kimchi butter and a soy-cured egg yolk, while shokupan honey toast finishes the meal with miso caramel and yuzu chantilly.
Saito is a fourth-generation industry veteran who grew up fascinated by his Japanese heritage. DŌZO lets him and Gamble explore Japanese cooking without pretending it stops at sushi and ramen. The menu moves between izakaya staples, Southern ingredients, and American comfort food, with house-made pickles and sauces tying much of it together.
Gamble, a Charlotte native, discovered cooking through a state-championship high school culinary team before graduating from the Culinary Institute of America and working at Rooster’s and Noble Smoke. The two met at Rooster’s, then teamed up on Katsu Kart.
The full bar brings Japanese whisky highballs, small-production sake, and cocktails such as a Vietnamese coffee espresso martini. There’s also a patio with its own menu.
DŌZO has grown larger with each move, but the idea remains compact: two cooks using Japanese technique and their own history to make exactly the food they want to serve.
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