Sushi Aoki
I had dinner at Sushi Aoki tonight with my family, and it was very quiet with only 1 other table occupied. As we were perusing the menu, the waitress gave each of us a small bowl of marinated salmon bits. It was very tasty with green onions and a sour and salty sauce.
My mom wanted to try sockeye salmon sashimi, so we got a half order ($7.05). It was fresh and as my mom noted, very lean with no visible fat. I prefer the atlantic salmon when I'm eating sashimi though because I think the fat makes it a lot tastier.
We had a hot dish next: the chicken yakisoba ($7.50). The taste was very Chinese... I don't think the noodles were soba noodles; they were a lot thinner like Chinese chow mein. The chicken was tender and the sauce was done well, but I would call this dish chicken chow mein instead of chicken yakisoba.
We ordered a number of sushi rolls. The first to come were the Aoki roll ($4.50) and the premium Alaska roll ($8.50). I got the Aoki roll because I thought that a dish named after the restaurant would be a signature dish, but it wasn't impressive at all. It was a baby shrimp roll with avocado, lettuce and mayo. The picture in the menu shows a roll stuffed with shrimp with only a small bit of lettuce, but in the actual roll there was a huge chunk of avocado that overpowered the taste of all the other ingredients. I think the shrimp had been frozen for a long long time because I couldn't taste the shrimp at all. The premium Alaska roll was not much better as there was also a huge chunk of avocado with the dungeness crab and cucumber. Again the avocado covered the taste of everything else, so it was just like eating an avocado roll. Avocado wasn't even listed as an ingredient in the description of both rolls, so I think they just added it to take up more space and make the roll look bigger.
Then we had a kamikaze roll ($6.50) which was a deep fried spicy tuna roll with (surprise!) a huge chunk of avocado and some masago. I don't know how they deep fried it, but only the ends of the roll were coated with batter. Not that I liked the batter... it was quite greasy and filling. Also I did not expect a spicy tuna roll to have so little tuna. There was only a thin slice that I could barely taste, so again this ended up tasting like an avocado roll.
The only roll that I liked was the pink godzilla roll ($9.50), but that wasn't because the roll was done nicely. It was just because there was a fresh slice of kiwi and a strawberry on top of each piece of sushi drizzled with a generous amount of sauce. According to the description on the menu, there were 5 sauces: lemon, mayo, plum, unagi and spicy. I couldn't really taste the lemon, but the combination of the 5 sauces was delicious. The roll itself was very much like the kamikaze roll. It was also deep fried, with spicy tuna and chicken (finally no avocado!).
The last roll we had was the Philadelphia roll ($4.50). It was just a regular salmon and cream cheese roll, but the cream cheese didn't taste very fresh.
Most of the ingredients didn't taste fresh, and 3 of the rolls I had ended up tasting like avocado rolls. I also didn't like the deep fried rolls because of the oiliness. Overall the quality of food wasn't very good, and I probably wouldn't dine here again.
My mom wanted to try sockeye salmon sashimi, so we got a half order ($7.05). It was fresh and as my mom noted, very lean with no visible fat. I prefer the atlantic salmon when I'm eating sashimi though because I think the fat makes it a lot tastier.
We had a hot dish next: the chicken yakisoba ($7.50). The taste was very Chinese... I don't think the noodles were soba noodles; they were a lot thinner like Chinese chow mein. The chicken was tender and the sauce was done well, but I would call this dish chicken chow mein instead of chicken yakisoba.
We ordered a number of sushi rolls. The first to come were the Aoki roll ($4.50) and the premium Alaska roll ($8.50). I got the Aoki roll because I thought that a dish named after the restaurant would be a signature dish, but it wasn't impressive at all. It was a baby shrimp roll with avocado, lettuce and mayo. The picture in the menu shows a roll stuffed with shrimp with only a small bit of lettuce, but in the actual roll there was a huge chunk of avocado that overpowered the taste of all the other ingredients. I think the shrimp had been frozen for a long long time because I couldn't taste the shrimp at all. The premium Alaska roll was not much better as there was also a huge chunk of avocado with the dungeness crab and cucumber. Again the avocado covered the taste of everything else, so it was just like eating an avocado roll. Avocado wasn't even listed as an ingredient in the description of both rolls, so I think they just added it to take up more space and make the roll look bigger.
Then we had a kamikaze roll ($6.50) which was a deep fried spicy tuna roll with (surprise!) a huge chunk of avocado and some masago. I don't know how they deep fried it, but only the ends of the roll were coated with batter. Not that I liked the batter... it was quite greasy and filling. Also I did not expect a spicy tuna roll to have so little tuna. There was only a thin slice that I could barely taste, so again this ended up tasting like an avocado roll.
The only roll that I liked was the pink godzilla roll ($9.50), but that wasn't because the roll was done nicely. It was just because there was a fresh slice of kiwi and a strawberry on top of each piece of sushi drizzled with a generous amount of sauce. According to the description on the menu, there were 5 sauces: lemon, mayo, plum, unagi and spicy. I couldn't really taste the lemon, but the combination of the 5 sauces was delicious. The roll itself was very much like the kamikaze roll. It was also deep fried, with spicy tuna and chicken (finally no avocado!).
The last roll we had was the Philadelphia roll ($4.50). It was just a regular salmon and cream cheese roll, but the cream cheese didn't taste very fresh.
Most of the ingredients didn't taste fresh, and 3 of the rolls I had ended up tasting like avocado rolls. I also didn't like the deep fried rolls because of the oiliness. Overall the quality of food wasn't very good, and I probably wouldn't dine here again.
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