Ever since finding out about Tobiko Sushi, I’ve been frequently getting sushi from there. This time I went with a new set of friends on Canada day, but sadly it was closed. We decided to go across the street to try out Yoko Sushi instead. Upon going in we were quickly greeted and sat down. It was really cold in there with the AC blasting.

I ordered the yakisoba with chicken bento box and tamago, while my friend ordered the sushi bento box, and my other friend ordered his standard 3 – spicy salmon roll, dynamite roll, and dragon roll. For bento boxes, you have to add an extra $2 if it’s not dinner time. Aren’t bento boxes usually eaten during lunch?

The bento boxes came out very fast, almost as if it was premade and just heated, don’t worry, I don’t think that was the case. The bento boxes came with the main, miso soup, tempura, a korokke, gyoza, salad, and an orange. For mine, I had to add another $2 ($4 total) to add chicken. It’s a pretty good deal before all of the additions. The bento box would’ve been $8.95 before adding the fact that it was lunch time, and that I wanted chicken. The tempura was hot and very crispy, though I personally thought some of the vegetables were a bit undercooked.  The gyoza’s filing was good but the wrapper was way too thick and chewy where it folds over at the top. My yakisoba was way too saucy and it was basically swimming in the sauce. The chicken was fairly scarce too, and there was a ton of cabbage. I wished I had more noodles. The rice for my tamago nigiri was kind of harder than it should be, but my friend said the rice with their sushi was alright.

My friend was far from impressed with the sushi. He said the dynamite roll seemed like they put actual salt on it, and it was loaded with lots of imitation crab meat. The dragon roll too was packed with imitation crab meat, and said he wouldn’t have ordered either if it was just going to be glorified California rolls. He did enjoy the spicy salmon roll though.

I probably won’t be coming back here as Tobiko sushi is just across the street and is way better.

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Yoko Sushi
102-16013 Fraser Hwy
Surrey, BC

(604) 507-5575

Tobiko Sushi is possibly our newest favourite sushi joint in Surrey, the current being Maguro. It’s located in Fleetwood by the Pizza Hut and Wendy’s. The menu is pretty cool in that it has a bunch of Dragon Rolls in almost all of the Power Ranger colours. No joke. The menu has a lot of rolls, and for sure, my friends want to try all the Dragon Rolls. They have a bunch of dishes on their walls which aren’t on their menu, so be sure to look around. They also serve bubble tea – unfortunately my zodiac sign’s drink ran out of lychee. My friend’s gemini drink was delicious though.

I ordered an Oyako Don and a Tokyo Crunch Roll. The oyako don was a bit different from what I was used to. I’m used to the egg already being cooked and mixed in with the rice with the onions and sauce. This one came with a raw egg cracked on top of my breaded chicken. Most of the sauce was already at the bottom, and got tastier the deeper I got into the bowl. The chicken was crisp and tender. It was good, but a bit different. I like my eggs cooked, and the rice mixed better. The Tokyo Crunch roll is a deep fried california roll with a sweet sauce on it. It was crisp, but the sushi got a bit too warm, and got a bit pasty.

My friends ordered the Miso Soup, Super Dragon Roll, Takoyaki, Black Dragon Roll, Priate Ship Roll, and Avocado Roll. The Super Dragon Roll was huge, and a little strange, in the fact they put cheese on top of the sushi between the roll and salmon – but, it was processed cheese…still my friend liked it. My friends liked all the rolls actually. My friend was craving a plain avocade roll, and it was the best he’s had. So buttery and rich. The takoyaki almost didn’t come, we had to ask to remind them. The friend who typically doesn’t like octopus was hesitant in trying it, but once he did he enjoyed it. There wasn’t that much octopus in it though, not sure if that’s a good thing to those that enjoy takoyaki.

Tobiko Sushi has lots of cool rolls, and the portions are really big. The price is pretty good too. We’re happy to find another local place to have some good Japanese food. My friends love the place, but I think I have to try a few more things (that I can eat) before I make it one of my favourites.

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Tobiko Sushi
15951 Fraser Hwy
Surrey, BC

(604) 572-5005

www.tobikosushi.com

Ta Ke Sushi is around the Panorama Village on Hwy 10 and 152nd Street in Surrey. When we arrived there was a foul smell in the area, like very rancid garbage. I’m not sure what it was, because it was all around the area, even when we drove away to a nearby Shoppers Drug Mart.

I ordered a ton katsu, chicken teriyaki roll, inari and tamago nigiri.My friend ordered a sushi combo and a house roll. We both got a miso soup to start. It had a nice flavour to it, but for some reason it was inconsistent. My friend’s bowl of soup had green onions and tofu, where as mine had literally none. Just all liquid soup.

The rest of our food came pretty quickly. My chicken teriyaki was very good. You have the choice of thigh or breast when you order any of the chicken dish.  I ordered the thigh, which is about 50 cents or a dollar cheaper depending on the dish. I noticed that they cut their sushi really thin though. The chicken was moist with a very crispy breading. It was really good, and definitely one of the better chicken teriyaki rolls I’ve had. There was just a tiny bit of the sweet teriyaki sauce. It was very good, but I think it was the crispy chicken that did it for me. The port katsu came on a plate with red/white checkered paper. Very American looking. It was a very thin pork chop breaded and deep fried. It was very crispy, but that’s pretty much it. I think the breading was thicker than the actual meat. Nothing great about this katsu. It didn’t have much flavour, and a little bit dry. The sauce on top added a little bit of sweetness, but didn’t add much to the overall dish.

My friend liked his sushi, but I don’t think he said it was amazing by any means. It was better than what we had at Tawara though, but just by a little. The price is a little bit more than your standard sushi joint in Surrey too. I’d come back for the chicken teriyaki roll.

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Ta Ke Sushi
15335 56 Ave
Surrey, BC

(604) 576-0145

http://www.ta-kesushi.ca

Sunny Dragon is a Korean owned Chinese, Japanese, all Asians in one restaurant in Surrey.

This all Asians in one restaurant has a lot of items on their menu, mostly Chinese and Japanese food. My friends and I ordered a bunch of things including the Sweet and Sour Pork, a Japanese Dinner Box, Gyozas, Agedashi Tofu, and a couple sushi rolls. I, for some reason was craving for Korean rice cakes. So when I finally found a Vegetable Rice Cake Soup on the menu, I was pretty excited to get it.

My soup came first, and it was not what I wanted at all. Instead of the white rice cakes I was expecting, they were rice crispy looking squares floating in soup. And instead of Vegetable soup, I was secretly upgraded to the seafood version of the soup. Yup, they messed up my order. Luckily I wasn’t allergic to seafood, and got it for the price of the Vegetable soup.

The soup itself was a little sweet, I wasn’t sure where the sweetness came from. There were bits of vegetables, and seafood in it. The rice crispy squares got soft from the soup, but they still held together pretty well. I think if you are a fan of Chinese corn soup, you might like it just because of its sweetness. The soup was OK, the rice cakes gave it a different texture, and I was disappointed that they weren’t the ‘right’ rice cakes I wanted.

The Sweet and Sour pork would have been a decent dish if they used less batter on the pork. I would say it was mostly a sweet pork dish because I couldn’t taste the sour part of it.

One item you probably want to avoid getting here is the Gyoza. As my gyoza fiend friend described it, it tasted like pork wrapped in pancake batter. There was an unpleasant after taste, that tasted like pancake batter and the pork was not flavorful at all.

I thought it was a good concept to have different cuisines in one restaurant, however usually the quality of food in these restaurants are average or below par. Sunny Dragon was just another average Chinese / Japanese food joint.

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Sunny Dragon Restaurant
#101 – 15988 Fraser Highway
Surrey, BC V3S
(604) 572-5122

Last week I got to visit Tawara. It’s a family owned restaurant in the Panorama Ridge area near 152nd St and Hwy 10 in Surrey. Looking at the menu it wasn’t one of the cheaper sushi joints in town.

Surprisingly, I ordered a bunch of stuff other than sushi, and for the hell of it, I ordered a Tamago nigiri. I ordered the Agedashi Tofu, Ramen, and Spicy Chicken. I could tell all of the dishes were made with care, but I wasn’t too impressed with most of the flavours. The agadeshi tofu was probably the best one. It was 5 pieces of battered and fried tofu completely separate from the sauce. I guess it’s good that it’s separate so it won’t get soggy after sitting in the sauce too long, but I did notice that it did lack flavour. The tofu was fried perfectly though, nice crunch outside, and the inside still was kinda firm, not soggy, just wish it was seasoned more. The sauce added a bit of saltiness, but not enough. I think it was missing daikon and green onions for more contrast and flavour.

I don’t know why I did it, but I ordered the Ramen too. I think Ramen is only good at Ramen restaurants, and the best part of a bowl of ramen is the fatty pork. The ramen here like most sushi places didn’t have the fatty pork, and either used the wrong noodles, or cooked it too long. The soup came with a bunch of vegetables – enoki mushrooms, bok choy, green onions – and noodles. The broth was decent, but the noodles were pretty soggy, didn’t have a bite to it anymore.

The chicken was also a bit weird. It came in bite sized pieces, but  something about the batter was strange. It kind of had a grainy texture to it. And the chicken wasn’t very tender anymore. The sauce was OK, at least it wasn’t just that sweet thai chili sauce that’s used in a lot of places.

Finally, the tamago was really bright yellow. I’m not exactly sure what it was, but it wasn’t that good. The texture in either the egg or the rice wasn’t right, but I couldn’t put my finger on it. That said, my friend actually liked his tamago that came in his chirashi don. So maybe I’m weird.

My friend ordered the Chirashi Don, and a spicy salmon roll. He liked his food a lot more than I liked mine. We were also given a few pieces of ika kara-age on the house. By the time we got to it, it was already cooled down, so we couldn’t really tell if it was good or not. I only took a tiny bite, because I’m still allergic to seafood.

The service was really good, and the decor was really nice. I think I’d go back to try their rolls. I’d stay away from the Ramen and the chicken dish. It is a little bit pricier too though.

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Tawara Japanese
103-15153 Hwy 10
Surrey, BC

(604) 574-5353

Akari is a Sushi Place near Scott Rd and 72nd Ave in Surrey’s Newton area. It’s pretty much right across the street from Strawberry Hill. I swear I have been here before, but I’m not too sure. Maybe I’ve just been in the area a few times.

Anyways, me and a friend ate their for lunch, and we both decided on getting some lunch specials. I ordered the Teriyaki Lunch Box, which comes with Miso Soup, Chicken Teriyaki, Veggie and Prawn Tempura, Green Salad, Pickled Vegetables, and a piece of fruit. Strangely it didn’t come with any rice.The miso soup was OK, but didn’t come with any or much tofu. There was a few pieces of green onions. The green salad was pretty standard.

The chicken was served with a healthy amount of teriyaki sauce over top and served over some bean sprouts. The chicken was tender and juicy and the teriyaki sauce was decent. Nothing incredible, but nothing to criticize. The deal came with two pieces of prawn tempura, a zuchini, and sweet potato. They were decent, the batter was nice and airy. The first bite of the prawn tempura was all batter though. The pickled vegetables were OK. Not very pickled or vinegary tasting. They still had a nice crunch though.

My friend ordered a lunch combo, which came with miso soup, a green salad, a special roll called a Crazy Roll, and her choice of a skewer. She chose the Tori Kushiage, which is a chicken skewer with green onion. The Crazy Roll is a deep fried california roll with unagi sauce and it was pretty good. But it was more filling because it was deep fried. The batter wasn’t too thick, and but it wasn’t too crispy. Just a little, they could’ve maybe fried it for a few seconds longer. The kushiage chicken was pretty good too. It was flavoured really well, and nice and tender.

I asked for a bowl of rice to go with my chicken teriyaki, but they forgot to bring it, but that’s OK. The waitresses were kind, and the price was reasonable. I think both of our combos were a little under $10. I’d come back to Akari if I was in the Surrey-Newton area and wanted some sushi.

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Akari Japanese Restaurant
7261 120 St
Surrey, BC

(604) 590-1192

I haven’t been to Tokachi for a very long time, probably pushing over a decade. I decided to try it out again recently because although the location is a bit iffy, the food was pretty good, and a lot of the people on Urbanspoon agree. I finally went back a few weeks ago, and I was glad I did.

I ordered the Spinach Gomae, and Agadeshi Tofu and also ordered a Chicken Teriyaki Roll, Tamago Nigiri, Inari Nigiri, and a glass of Asahi for about $23. It was a bit pricier than other places, but it was really good.

The Spinach Gomaae was $3.95, and was the best I’ve ever had, maybe because this isn’t typically something I order. It had a nice sesame sauce, and was sprinkled with lots of toasted sesame. Really good flavours here, and a bit of sweetness. I think I may order this more often now. The Agadeshi Tofu was also very good. It was still very crispy out of the fryer, and nice and soft on the inside. The tofu had a wonderful tempura sauce, and some grated radish and green onions on top.

The Chicken Teriyaki Roll was quite expensive for $5.50, but when it came it was big (and therefore worth it!). It had just a little bit of teriyaki sauce within the roll (not drizzled on top), and had huge chunks of chicken in it. Really good flavour and lots of  meat. Each of the nigiri I ordered was $1.50. The tamago had a nice huge, thick piece of egg and it had a nice sweetness to it. The Inari was pretty standard and good too. Slight sweetness from the marinated tofu pocket.

My friend ordered the house roll, and an assorted sushi platter which came with 7 types of nigiri, and sushi for $14.95. All of the seafood were really fresh. The menu says it comes with a tuna/salmon roll. Does that mean both or just one? He wasn’t given a choice though, so he was a bit confused. The House Roll was a bit of a disappointment, as it looked similar to a California roll with smoked salmon on top. However, it was actually steamed prawn and radish inside. It was only $5.50 too though, so it wasn’t too expensive. But he probably wouldn’t order it again.

Ten plus years later, and I’m finally back, and I think I will be coming back here more often. The food was really good for sushi in Surrey. I just hope I don’t spend $20+ each time.

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Tokachi
10767 King George Highway
Surrey, BC

(604) 951-3800

www.tokachi.ca

I’ve known about Akasaka as that kind of pricey sushi place next to Oriental Buffet in Guildford. I’ve never been there until a few days ago for my friend’s birthday – it’s her favorite sushi place in Surrey. I got there, and the parking lot was full! I had to park across the street at Guildford Mall.

Inside there are a lot of private rooms. It’s a Japanese/Korean restaurant like many Japanese restaurants. Along with your sushi you can also get Korean BBQ and noodles. They have the button that you press to get service and they came pretty quickly. The prices are on the more expensive side of things when it comes to sushi in Surrey with some rolls over $12. I only ordered a chicken teriyaki roll, and 2 tamago, and 2 inari, and it came out to $11.50 after tax. Sometimes this can cost as low as $8. To be honest, it wasn’t even nearly that good. I’ve had better chicken teriyaki rolls, and it didn’t even come with teriyaki sauce. The Inari was pretty good though, as they used a whole pocket instead of half like some people do. It could’ve used a bit more sweetness. The tamago nigiri had a big piece of egg, but the flavour wasn’t as sweet or have much flavour.

But! A lot of the stuff my friends ordered were good and very well presented. Akasaka likes to use fire. First came the Oyster Motoyaki which was served on a plate, with a side of fire! What did it do? Who knows as the fire was off to the side, I think it just looked cool. Some other stand-outs were the Volcano Roll which was wrapped in tin foil, and lit on fire. It had the cheesy/mayo topping of an Oyster Motoyaki with shrimp, and snapper I think. They also had another roll which was on a bed of crunchy bread crumbs. From what my friends told me, everything was good except for one dish where the fish wasn’t very fresh.

The service was also a bit slow. They were kind and meant well, but they were a bit slow and a hard to understand. They were slow when it came to bringing some tea, or water. Sometimes they forget, and then they remember when they came back and say.. “Oh, it’s coming.” Another thing that was kind of annoying is that even though she numbered us, when we received our receipts, the numbers were off. I was number #12 I think, but after looking at the bills, I was customer #5 now. Kind of annoying how we had to look at each receipt to see which was ours instead of just look for our given numbers.

In the end though, I would come back with my friends so they can try out all the different sushi rolls!

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Akasaka Japanese Restaurant
15110 101 Avenue
Surrey, BC

(604) 588-8656

I saw that a new Japanese restaurant had opened up where Anducci’s used to be on 152nd St in Surrey. I wanted to check it out, but the reviews on DineHere were pretty bad back in January. I checked on UrbanSpoon today and it turns out that it’s getting better – 80%. Sadly they don’t have a website for me to check their menu.

I got to the restaurant and was quickly greeted and seated. It was a bit odd at my table though as I saw metal chop sticks, is this place Korean? I think so, because it didn’t sound like Japanese when they spoke to each other. Anyways, I browsed through the menu and I noticed the prices are very expensive!

I ordered the Chicken Teriyaki Don ($7.99), Chicken Katsu Roll ($5.99), Tamago Nigiri ($1.25) and Inari ($1.25). My Chicken Teriyaki don surprisingly came first, and it seemed quite small. There were about 6 slices of chicken on top of beansprouts and carrots which were on top of rice. My first bite wasn’t very good, as the chicken was slightly burnt, however the rest of my bowl was really good. The teriyaki sauce was nice and a bit sweet, but not too much. The chicken was pretty tender still, and the rice was cooked well.

I was really excited to see the Chicken Katsu Roll. They also had a Pork Katsu Roll, and I’ve never seen these two at any other places so I had to try it. It was basically like your standard chicken teriyaki rolls, but it came with breaded fried chicken. It also came with some sauce, and some cucumbers and lettuce, and topped with toasted and black sesame seeds. The chicken was cooked really well and it was nice and crispy! The only complaint I had about this roll was that it may have been too small. To get 6 pieces, they had to cut some of them pretty thin that they were hard to keep in together when picking it up. My chicken often fell out. It was really good though.

My Tamago was less than awesome, as it didn’t have much flavour to it, and not the sweetness that I’m used to and really like. It wasn’t like it was just fried egg, as it had a hint of something else, but not strong enough. The Inari was also less than awesome. They just used half a tofu pocket. The ginger was also very very spicy.

My friend ordered his favourite Chirashi don which was $16.99. The chirashi don was only $9.99 at Maguro, so this is very pricey. He had to try it though. it came with tamago, roe, salmon, a couple different types of tuna, octopus, some weird thingy, and a whole shrimp served on top of rice and daikon. It was really good, a little better, and a little more, but not worth almost double the Chirashi at Maguro. The few things he would change is that the he would leave the tamago as one piece instead of cutting it into small cubes. He also wished it had unagi.

He also ordered the Spicy Yellow Tai Roll which was $7.99. This looked really good as it was a deep fried roll with red snapper and cream cheese. It was different but really good.

Now what was so expensive? Besides the $17 Chirashi don, a lot of the special rolls were over $12. Kind of unheard of being that this place was in Surrey and not Downtown.

That being said, the service was really good. They often came by to refill our tea and asked how we were doing, and even asked if I was cold. It seemed like whoever was free would check up on us to see if everything was OK. I think in total 4 of them came up to refill our tea or checked up on how everything was. I like this place, but the prices are a bit too high for your everyday sushi place. I’d recommend it, but only once in a while.

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Sushi Tengoku
10194 152 St
Surrey, BC

(604) 584-9878

Note: One funny thing is that on the menu by the Sushi it had two columns.. Roll and Corn.. It took me a quite a while to figure out what that meant. Corn? Sushi? What?… I’m guessing they mean Cone lol.

Hanako is a tiny Japanese restaurant in Surrey.  This restaurant’s authencity and quality is probably the best in Surrey, and better than most small sushi places in Metro Vancouver.

It’s been a while since I’ve been there, so a few nights ago I went in for dinner with my family. We ordered some of our favorites, and then some more. We had Ebi Sunomono, Spicy Tuna Roll, Hanako Roll, Dynamite Roll, Negitoro Cone, Nabeyaki Udon, Tonkatsu, and Asari Garlic Butter.

I’ll start with the sushi rolls, the sushi rolls were great. They were well made, not sloppy, and really tasty. The rolls we we had were very common among Japanese restaurants, but Hanako managed to get their own twist on them.

The tuna in the  Spicy Tuna Roll was mashed up really well, the texture was really smooth. It wasn’t overwhelmingly spicy, it was really good. The Hanako Roll was their house special roll, it had almost everything from tuna, avocado, salmon, tobiko, etc. The size isn’t too large for you to eat it in one bite, which was nice and easy to eat. The Dynamite Roll isn’t your typical crab meat with tempura prawns here. Instead of crab meat, they used tempura yams, avocado and lettuce. I really liked the flavor that the yams gave in that roll. I was very happy with all 3 rolls, I would order them again, they were all flavorful, I barely used any soy sauce or wasabi when I ate them.

The Asari Garlic Butter was on their specials menu. It was steamed clams with garlic and butter. It was pretty good, I could taste the garlic and the butter. I’m always afraid of eating clams at restaurants because I’d always get a couple with sands in them, but no sands here! This dish cooled down rather quickly, so I’d suggest you eat it right away when it comes.

The Tonkatsu is a must get here. It’s deep friend pork chop, and it came with a bowl of rice, miso soup, sherdded cabbage, cucumbers, mustard, and sweet dipping sauce. This Tonkatsu was so yummy with the dipping sauce and rice. The steamed rice here was also really good, how can steamed rice be good by itself? well, it just was. The shredded cabbage had a dressing on top, eat it between your pork pieces or with it and you’ll never get sick of the taste of the dish. The cucumber just hads a refreshing taste to the dish. One of the best Tonkatsu I’ve ever had.

The Nabeyaki Udon was also really nice, the broth was clean, it had clams, shitaki mushrooms, fish cake, and 2 tempura prawns. The Negitoro Cone was awsesome, it had so much finely chopped green onions in it, and the tuna was really nicely mashed up, so yummy.

The waitresses here were really nice, they always ask if they could take the dishes away even though the plates were empty. They were also constantly checking if we’re doing ok. The decor was small, cozy and simple.

Eating here could get a bit pricy. Most of their items were more expensive than other Japanese restaurants. You will not find giant sushis here, this was the place that focused on the quality.

Note: Closed on Tuesdays

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Hanako Japanese Restaurant
15135 101 Ave
Surrey, BC V3R
(604) 582-8833

I went to Guildford Sushi House earlier this week. I’ve always known about, because it’s right beside Kim Hoang Pho, but never went in. One of my friends said they always got their sushi from there even though they live in Cloverdale because it’s cheap and pretty good. Well the cheap part is true, and they have big portions, but their sushi is … I’m kind of undecided.

I went with a friend, and we decided to try it out by ordering just a few pieces of sushi first. We didn’t want to invest too much in case it did suck, like wheel said. So I ordered a Chicken Teriyaki Roll (only $2.95!), Tamago ($0.99), and an Inari ($0.99). This is what I get everywhere, so I can use it to compare. The chicken teriyaki roll was not bad. The chicken was nice and crispy and cooked perfectly. But, the teriyaki sauce was very light, and not thick at all, they also used it very sparingly as you can see from my picture. The rice was also weird. They used quite a bit of rice in mine, and it was kind of mushy. I’m not sure if it’s because it was over cooked, or if they just handled it too much. It didn’t have much texture. The inari though was good, and it seemed like the rice was completely different. The tamago was OK too, and the rice had some texture. But the rice wasn’t the same as what was in the tamago. I don’t know what it is, but maybe their hands were two wet, and maybe warm that it changed the texture of the rice. All I can say that it was very inconsistent.

My friend tested it out by ordering some salmon rolls, and a tama unagi roll which he hasn’t seen before. It has unagi and tamago and some tobiko. He said it was pretty good, but there was too much rice, and it could’ve used more tobiko.

In the end, we acutally didn’t end up finishing up our dinner here and went to Maguro instead. To me this place wasn’t THAT bad, but the rice just wasn’t prepared well. If it was, and the sauce was a bit better, the chicken teriyaki roll would be very good.

Their prices are very cheap, and you get pretty big portions for that price. I would give them one more chance, in hopes that the rice wouldn’t be mushy. But from my experience this day, I’d have to give them 2.5/5. Rice is an important part of sushi.

Note: They don’t accept credit cards. They are cash or debit only.

Guildford Sushi House
10330 152nd Street #40
Surrey, BC

(604) 588-8620

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We were quickly seated, given our menus, and served our tea. I was already pretty hungry, but we had to wait another 10 minutes before the server came to take our order. There was only one server though, and about 4-5 tables filled. I ordered an Oyako don (chicken with rice & egg) ($7.95), a Chicken Teriyaki Roll ($4.25), and a Tamago ($1.50). This place is a bit more pricey that the cheaper Japanese restaurants in Surrey. I base the price on either a roll of Kappa or a piece of Tamago or Inari. At the cheap end Kappa usually costs $2.00, and tamago usually $1. The Chicken Teriyaki Roll typically it would be about $3.50. My friend ordered the house special roll ($7.95), and the Chirashi don ($9.95), which I’ve actually never heard of.

The sushi rolls came pretty quickly along with our Miso Soup. The Miso Soup was good, and it came with bits of tofu, green onion, and seaweed.  My chicken teriyaki roll was pretty good too. Not the best ever, but good. The chicken was a bit messy as there were small chunks of chicken that had already fallen out of the roll. The chicken was still nice and crispy, and the teriyaki sauce was a little mild. I think if the sauce was a bit more flavourful, it would’ve been a lot better. I still think Futago wins. My friend’s House Special Roll had cooked salmon, cucumber, cream cheese, and avocado with a crispy top. He said it was good, but too creamy because of the cream cheese and avocado. A crunch was missing because the crispy bits on the top weren’t crispy at all. The sauce added a nice hit of spice to it.

Just as we finished our Sushi our donburi’s came. My oyako don came and a chicken teriyaki don came. Wait… we never ordered a Chicken Teriyaki don! But damn it looked a lot better than my food. We told the server that we didn’t order the Chicken Teriyaki, but the Chirashi Don. I guess Chirashi could sound like Chicken Teriyaki if you mumbled haha… Anyways, since the Chirashi don is basically sashimi on rice, it came pretty quickly and looked great.

My Oyako Don looked very plain and bland. Didn’t look like there was very much sauce to it, and my chicken was colorless. They egg was mixed with onions, mushrooms, and some carrot and served on top of the rice, and then the chicken on top of that. At first, it was pretty tasteless, and I was wondering where all of the sauce was? Well, I kept eating and the further I got into my bowl the better my food got. I guess I should’ve mixed everything up before eating it. The last half of the bowl was delicious. My tamago was OK. It stuck to the wooden dish, so it fell apart quite easily. My friend also loved his Chirashi don, and it was quite a bit of food. Our tummies were both satisfied by the end of our meal.

Although our waitress screwed up an order and was very slow at first, she made up for it and was quick to give us more tea, and the kitchen was able to make the Chirashi don quickly, and still made it look good. I’m not sure why it took me 10 years to come back here, but Maguro was quite good. I’d probably come back.

Maguro
Suite #141
10090 152 St
Surrey, BC V3R 8X8

(604) 585-0054

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Anyways, they just opened, so I’ll be a bit lenient.

I was hungrier than normal, so I didn’t order my regular Chicken Teriyaki Rolls + Tamago + Inari. I actually got a Chicken Teriyaki Don, 1 Tamago, and 1 Inari. So different eh? We placed our order, and sadly they took a very long time to make the food. Beipas waited about 30 minutes before she even got any of her food. Our don’s came with Miso soup, and came in about 10-15 minutes, but it took another 15 minutes to get the sushi. There wasn’t even anyone in there, so I’m not sure why it took so long. Our order wasn’t that big.

Aside from my order, one friend also ordered a Chicken Teriyaki Don, and a Spicy Crunch Roll. Beipas ordered a Chicken Teriyaki Roll, Spicy Tuna Roll, and an Inari. Not that big of an order right? I don’t know why they were so slow at making our food.

So I started off with my Miso Soup. It was OK, the only thing was that I wish the tofu was softer. They seemed to use a firmer tofu compared to other places. It had a few green onions floating around. The teriyaki sauce was very sweet. The sauce was pretty thick, and good at first, but I got sick of the sauce as I ate more. The chicken teriyaki didn’t seem to be fried or have the skin on, which I would have preferred. But I did finish it. It also came with a few pieces of steamed brocolli. The tamago and the inari were what you would expect. Nothing special, but still very tasty (at least for me, since I can’t eat seafood, so this is the closest I’ll get).

Beipas says that the Chicken Teriyaki Roll is still the best she’s ever had. I’ll have to order it next time to see if I agree.

Even paying took a little while. We asked to separate the bills, and the lady at the cashier wasn’t sure how to do it. However, I will definitely give them another chance, because they just recently started their business up, so they are still getting a hang of everything and the menu. I hope they can speed up and be as good as Futago was, or else I’ll have to find another place to get my non-seafood sushi fix.

There is another Sushi Yama in Vancouver, but I don’t think they are related. Inside the Surrey restaurant, it said Yama Sushi which got us a little bit confused.

Sushi Yama
9175 148 Street
Surrey, BC V3R 3W7
(604) 585-6040