Sakura Sushi Japanese Restaurant
1550 Kingston Rd
Pickering, Ontario
Cuisine(s): Japanese, sushi
Date visited: June 2010
I like reading up on Restaurantica to find good eats. The problem is that a lot of "newbies" post reviews and you have to take those posts with a grain of salt because you don't know whether they're legit posters or people just boosting up the rating and reviews for the restaurant. A few people had posted about this place so we decided to try it out for lunch one weekend.
Food: 4.5/5
We ordered edamame for starters, and then spicy salmon roll, dragon roll and spider roll. We were given a small trio dish of appetizers before the edamame - and wow were they good! I don't remember what they all were but one was a warm dry noodle sample, and another might have been cabbage. Our edamame came piping hot along with our sushi (we were hoping the sushi would come a bit later so we could eat the hot edamame). The spicy salmon roll was good, as was the spider roll. The dragon roll was very good - you could taste the freshness of the sushi.
Service: 3.5/5
One of my biggest peeves at restaurants is if the waiter/waitress doesn't top off your water or tea. The waitress was very nice - smiling and always saying "you're welcome" to our "thank you"'s, but she didn't come back very often after the sushi was served. We ran out of tea quite quickly and had to beckon her a few times. I could hear the chef welcome regulars whenever they came in, and that's always nice to hear.
Atmosphere: 4/5
The restaurant was small but cozy. The door was propped open to circulate air and it was a tad warm. We were seated in a well endowed booth, and it had a very nice Japanese feel to it. Didn't get a chance to use the washroom.
Price/Value: 4/5
For dinner we usually order what we ordered here - an appetizer and 3 rolls. But it looks like our eyes were bigger than our stomachs, and it also turns out that their portion sizes are a little bigger! Usually spicy salmon rolls come in 6 and special rolls come in 8 or 10. But here, there were 8 spicy salmon rolls and I think up to 12 for the spider roll. Throw in the the free appetizer they gave us on top of the one we ordered and we found ourselves crawling at the end to finish all of it off. The spicy salmon rolls were a bit bigger than what I'm used to (and the "sauce" looked a bit strange) and the other rolls were of average size. Given all this, I think the price was very justified for the amount of food we got.
Overall dining experience: 4/5
Squished in the plaza, we almost didn't find this place. We were very pleased with the food and the quantity. The free appetizer they gave us were very much bonus points as it was free AND delicious. I think we'll definitely be returning to this place; I just hope that next time they top off our tea more often :)
