sushi Archives - Curiously Carmen

Ebisu – Richmond Location

October 29, 2016

The boyfriend and I are avid sushi lovers. On any given day, we are probably eating Japanese food or otherwise just cooking at home. One of our favourite places to go is Ebisu, although we don’t go there as often as we’d like.

After a busy summer semester, we decided to celebrate by going to Ebisu in Richmond! I wish I remembered to take a photo of our booth, but unfortunately, I didn’t. We were seated in a booth right next to the bar, and was able to see the exorbitant array of alcohol up close. Although I’m not a fan of hard liquor, their collection was truly impressive and pretty cool!

Prawn tempura nabeyaki udon, $11.50: The price for the udon was a bit steeper than what I normally would pay, but Ebisu is a bit more upscale. I don’t like when the tempura comes inside the soup, as it makes it soggy. We quickly took the tempura out before it got super soggy.

This dish was comforting and filling, and had a good amount of udon in it. It could have used a bit more chicken, and the breast was a bit bland but still juicy. The boyfriend really enjoyed the soup, which was a bonito base.
Miso soup, free: This came with the other dish. The miso soup was pretty standard, but I liked how it came with a good amount of tofu and seaweed inside.
Ebi sunomono, free: Again, this came with the party boat that we ordered. Both of us aren’t really big fans of ebi sunomono, but this one was pretty standard.
Chicken teriyaki boat, $14.95: Don’t let the giant boat fool you, because the boat is actually only good for one person. It looks big but it isn’t really thaaaaat much food.

We really enjoyed the chicken teriyaki. The chicken was very juicy, and the skin had a nice smoky crunch to it. The tempura tasted fresh. Meanwhile, the 3 pieces of california roll and 3 pieces of dynamite roll were pretty standard.
Chicken karaage, $8.25: Yum, this was delicious! My stomach is pretty sensitive to oily foods though, so I only ate the small piece. However, it was very crunchy and fresh! We would definitely order this again. Although, we came back to this location a year later and the chicken karaage was not as good.

All in all, we enjoyed our visit to Ebisu and will be back to one of their locations. The service was a bit slow at times though. There were a couple times where we were trying to order/get our bill, but the server was cleaning and wiping down the tables for closing.

Yay!

Tentatsu- Burnaby Location

October 13, 2016

You may be familiar with the original Tentatsu restaurant in East Van, by Hastings and Nanaimo. Tentatsu recently just opened their second location in Burnaby, about a 8 minute drive from the original!

The boyfriend and I decided to try it on a whim one evening.

In addition, Tentatsu was having a 10% grand opening discount! Perfect time to try it out and see if it matched the original.

The restaurant itself is really big and spacious. It reminds me of a dance hall and is good for large groups.

Compared to the original location, I liked the service here a LOT better. Thinking about the service at the original makes me so angry because of how atrocious it was.

The staff weren’t friendly, but quick and efficient enough. Or maybe because I have such low standards from the original Tentatsu that I thought their service was decent (actually, this is definitely the case).

We were also impressed with how they served quality genmaicha tea (Japanese match green tea w/ brown rice) for free! I was happy when our food came quite quickly, unlike the original location where my mom and I waited almost 30 minutes when it wasn’t that busy.

California roll: The California roll was decent, and tasted fresh. It has a good about of ripe avocado inside and topped with crunchy sesame seeds.

Salmon roll: The rice in the salmon roll was still warm, but it was good nonetheless.

Tuna roll: The tuna roll was decent as well, no complaints about it!

Salmon nigiri: I only wanted one to try their sashimi, but the boyfriend insisted I order 3. You will soon see why it was not a good idea!

The sashimi had a slight fishy taste to it and was fresh. Lately, I’ve been tasting ‘sashimi’ that has the texture of sashimi, but no taste. So, it was a relief when there was a slight salmon taste!

Negitoro roll: We were dissappointed with this roll because it barely came with any tuna. However, the tuna was fresh and tasted good! There was only a few measly pieces of green onion inside.

Negihamachi roll: I didn’t try this because I was too busy trying to finish the other dishes. The boyfriend thought it was okay, but could have used more flavour. Again, the rice was slightly warm.

House roll: The house roll was pretty decent! As with all the rolls, it tasted fresh. It is basically a large California roll with tamago and masago.

BC roll: Nope, not as good as Uomo next door. The salmon was a bit dry and bland and way too fishy.

Here is a picture of the negitoro roll. You can see the small amount of tuna compared to rice, and how little onion there was.

With a seemingly negative review, would I come back? Yes! Although it’s not the BEST, the prices are amazing for what you get. Service is quick and efficient too.

We ordered all this food, with so much leftovers for $25 including tip and tax! Granted, there was a 10% opening discount but $27-29 for all this food is really cheap. It’s a good option for a quick bite in the neighbourhood!

Yay!

Kilala Sushi

October 2, 2016

Earlier in the summer, myself, the boyfriend, and Sangria decided to venture out from our usual sushi joints and try a longstanding but hidden restaurant, Kilala Sushi. They’ve been around for awhile now, and I hear their name getting tossed around from time to time.

Kilala Sushi is an authentic Japanese restaurant, run solely by a husband and wife team. They also specialize in distributing tamago for various restaurants in Vancouver, so this place is half restaurant/half tamago-making factory? I say that because the sitting area itself is quite small but you can see that the back is a bit factory like, with a very big stainless steel kitchen.
Appetizer sashimi, $5.95: The appetizer sashimi comes with three pieces of tuna, and two pieces of salmon. The salmon was average, but the tuna was really good. It was very soft and buttery, and melted in your mouth.
Tamago roll, $2.25: As I mentioned above, they specialize in tamago, so it was only natural to try it! The tamago was sweet, fluffy, and tasted fresh. I really liked how it had a fluffy texture, as a lot of places I’ve been to have a harder texture with dried edges (which means it’s not fresh and has fried out).

Negitoro roll, $3.00: The boyfriend and I ALWAYS order negitoro roll, so we had to try Kilala’s version of it! It was pretty good, and above average. Just like the tuna sashimi, the tuna in here was also soft and buttery. It was filled with lots of green onion too. They definitely did not skimp out on the tuna and the onion.
Hmmm, I don’t recall what these two rolls were called and I can’t find anything similar on the online menu! Sorry.

Even though I don’t remember what they were called, I remember how they tasted! Both tasted very fresh, and were filling. Just look at how big that salmon sashimi is inside the roll!

All in all, Kilala serves quality and authentic sushi, and the three of us enjoyed our meal. Everything was fresh, and even though there was only one server (the wife, husband was the chef), service was quick and friendly.

The only downside of this place is that it is quite hidden behind a bush and the seating is also a cramped.

Yay!

Sushi UOmo – Revisit

July 11, 2016

Update 11/2018: Since writing this post, it seems that Uomo has changed ownership and things have gone downhill. The prices increase each time, while the quality and quantity decreased. We have stopped going here now.

I thought it was finally time to do a revisit post on Sushi UOmo! The last time I wrote about this place was December 2014, when we first tried it out.

Since then, UOmo has easily become our top place to go for cheap, consistently delicious sushi.

We come here probably at least once every two weeks, sometimes even more. My last review didn’t really do UOmo justice, so I finally took some pictures (after our 50th visit or more probably LOL) and will be talking about the go-to items we order here!
Tuna tataki, $7.95: Mmmm, where to even start with how delicious this is? The tuna tataki is cut thicker here than other places I’ve been to. The ponzu sauce is full of great, tangy flavour.

Coupled with the fresh onions and slightly grilled taste of the tuna meat, we order this every time we come now.
Sashimi salad, $8.95: If you’ve been keeping up with my food posts (and thank you if you do, I appreciate it!), you’ll know that I’ve been on a sashimi salad-loving streak lately. UOmo’s sashimi salad is what jump started my interest in sashimi salad, and has made me love it! Every time I order sashimi salad, I use UOmo as the standard to compare it with.

With that said, it’s usually pretty hard to top off, especially with the price. For $9, the plate comes with a VERY generous amount of assorted sashimi, that fills me up every time. Usually, I’m not full on salad but this hits the spot every time. It comes with an assortment of wild sockeye salmon, regular (farmed) salmon, tuna, shrimp, squid, octopus, tilapia sashimi.

I love the salad because of the generous assortment of sashimi. I used to just order salmon sashimi, but I like the salad because I get a variety of different sashimi that I normally wouldn’t order. The veggies are always fresh, and crunchy and comes with the same ponzu sauce as the tuna tataki, plus olive oil.
Crunch roll, $4.25: The crunch roll comes with shrimp tempura and avocado on the inside, and topped with either yam or sweet potato on the outside. The tempura here is consistently fresh and crunchy, making this roll super delicious. The avocado is always nice and creamy too!
Negitoro roll, $3.00: Yum! Our go-to maki roll, the negitoro. Negitoro is made from the tuna belly, so it contains more fat than a regular tuna sashimi. Then, it is mixed in with onions before being put into a roll. There is always a generous portion of sashimi to rice, and always tastes really fresh.
B.C. Roll, $3.50: Funny story – I used to hate B.C. rolls. I always saw them as the ‘food scrap’ roll aka. “let’s throw the salmon skin and wilted lettuce into a roll and call it a BC roll”. Basically, as the leftover ingredients mushed into one roll.

With that said, the BC roll at UOmo is the ONLY BC roll I would voluntarily order. A traditional BC roll comes with just salmon skin, but they include a decent amount of actual salmon meat. The salmon skin is also fried and tastes really fresh, as with the lettuce.

This is the only place I’ve been to where I feel like they actually put quality in a BC roll, because other places seem to snub the BC roll. Whenever I take people here, I tell them that they must order the BC roll but I am met with the same response I had before I tried that place (‘Ew, BC roll is gross and it’s just salmon skin’.). However, their minds always change after trying a piece because it’s that good!
Overall, UOmo is a fantastic joint and my go-to Japanese restaurant. It’s cheap, delicious, friendly service, and in the neighbourhood.

Yay!

Thanks for reading!

-Carmen

Hapa Beach- What happened to you?

January 26, 2015

Hi all!

Before I begin: I am doing a Cetaphil skincare set giveaway which is super simple to enter! Details and enter here!

Fun fact- The first restaurant post I ever did was on Hapa Izakaya last year at Dine Out Vancouver. We had an amazing time there, from the delicious food, ambiance, and friendly servers. With that said, we were really looking back to coming here again and I booked our reservation right away.

Hapa Beach, I’m not sure what happened to you. Change in ownership? We left very disappointed, the quality and preparation of the food comparable to all you can eat restaurants, minus the heaps and heaps of food. It was nothing like this the first time, I can’t believe that it is the same restaurant we went to a year ago.

When we first stepped in, we could tell that it was already busy. The hostess was on the phone for a few minutes before she was able to greet us, and we were sat quickly afterwards. We were also reminded a few times of the 1.5 hour dining limit.

For the first choice of appetizers, we ordered the taster appetizer (above) and bagna cauda fondue (below). The taster appetizer came with bok choy gomae, edamame beans, and tuna carpacccio. The bok choy was crunchy and fresh, with a generous amount of gomae sauce.

The tuna capaccio was very fresh and the ponzu sauce was good, but the portion was really small so just a heads up there (Yes, I understand that it’s an appetizer and also DOVF menu). The chilled edamame beans weren’t that great. It didn’t taste fresh and was over seasoned.

Ever since having amazing bagna cauda at Rajio , we wanted to try Hapa’s. The sauce was not mixed well, or it sat out for too long and separated. It was also bland in flavour, and one of the veggie pieces my boyfriend had was bitter.

The second course was the worst and this was when it reminded us of being at an all you can eat restaurant instead of at a nice izakaya. Let’s start with the aburi saba. It was mediocre, there was a slight grilled and smoky taste to it but it was not prepared well at all. Felt like they just slapped a bunch of pieces onto big chunks of rice, then put it on a plate to serve.

The agedashi tofu was drowned in the sauce and floating in oil. It did not look fresh at all, I’ve had better agedashi tofu at all you can eat actually. I’ll let this picture do the talking:

The outside batter of the tofu was slimy and sticky, and came right off the tofu when we tried to eat it. It lacked all flavour and just looked disgusting and pathetic in the bowl. We asked to exchange for the gyozas (the only thing left on the second course menu) instead because we are not eating or paying for this “tofu” . Where was the quality in this?

Although the servers were really attentive and nice, they seemed pretty new and said they had to ask the manager if they were able to switch for us. Fair enough. In the meantime, our main dishes were brought to us- more like being quickly thrown onto the table and having the servers dashing away before you could say thanks. Another point- shouldn’t a nicer establishment like Hapa have better service?

After all the disappointing starters (minus the few bok choy and quarter sized tuna carpaccio), our mains arrived. The spicy pork ishiyaki came with a decent amount of pork, and a raw egg that they stir in for you. The stone bowl is really hot and cooks it, and you’re also recommended to leave the rice for a few minutes so that it can become crispy due to the side of the bowl.

It also came with chives, which did not taste fresh either.

The boyfriend ordered the cho wagyu- four thinly sliced pieces of raw Kobe beef, which you cook yourself with the black stone and dip in ponzu sauce. Again, the portion was really small and thin although from the angle of the picture, it looks like a thick cut. He said it was pretty chewy, althought he made sure not to overcook it.

Again, he said it was pretty disappointing due to the size. I’m glad I ordered the rice bowl and we ended up sharing that.

When we were done our main course, our replacement appetizer came- pork gyozas. The server apologized for the ~~slimy tofu mess~~ agadashi tofu, and said since it was deep fried, that’s why it was oily. No, I know that deep fried food is oily…but the point was that the tofu batter was slimy and tasteless.

Anyways, the gyozas were not your usual gyozas. They came with minced pork, layered with lotus root and then deep fried. This was a LOT better than the slimy tofu mess. We weren’t sure if we actually enjoyed this dish a lot, or if everything else so far was so mediocre or abysmal that this was delicious.

Either way, the gyozas were cooked well and crispy. The lotus root made it really filling and there was a good amount of pork inside as well.

As for service, the entire time, we felt like we were being rushed. Our food was coming really fast and we had servers quickly taking away our dishes. They had told us 3 times about the 1.5 hour seating limit, we were there for a bit under a hour. It felt like the servers were there to just toss dishes on the table.

I’m not sure if I’ll come back but I kind of want to give them one last chance since we had a great time here last year. I feel like there might have been a change in management as the name of the place changed from Hapa Izakaya to Hapa Beach, but I think they’re still under the Hapa Izakaya family. All the more current reviews at Hapa are pretty negative as well.

Read a happier, more positive, and YUMMIER post on our original visit here.

Did you come here for Dine Out or just recently? I’m really curious to see if we just came on a bad day…

-Carmen