What Elephant Eats: Kabuki Sushi & Grill: Review

Hoi ヽ(・o・｡)ノ

Welcome to my second restaurant review :D This week I am writing about Kabuki Sushi & Grill, locate on 109st and Saskatchewan Dr. right by Garneau theater and High Level Diner, right across from Kyoto Japanese Restaurant.The location is not bad for people who are in the walking distant, however, finding parking spot around that area can be challenging. They have complicate system of customer parking which I don't fully understand, there are couple of spot right behind the restaurant, couple of spot in the back alley behind one of the house, and I believe that customers can park in front of the smile zone (Dental office, right next to restaurant) and they will reimburse the parking cost. Still this is too much of a hassle for many.

First Impression:

Kabuki is a relatively new restaurant in Edmonton. I believe they open a year ago. This place is small and cozy, probably seat about 30-40 people, and can feels cramp at time. There are a huge sakura (cherry blossom) tree in the middle of the dining area. If you are lucky you might be seat under the sakura tree and hopefully it will make you feel like spring in Japan (except then you look outside and realize that its snowing and -30c). All jokes aside, this place have a pretty good decor and the color scheme of green tea green and brown go together quite well.

I actually ate here several time before and is one of my favorite place to go with my girlfriend with my friends. The service here is very good but can be slow at times. Many times we have to wait 5 min or more for tea/water, especially when you are in a big group. This could be that there are one 2 servers (I am pretty sure the owners are the one who serve), both of them are very nice and would accommodate various request you have about the food. Once orders are taken, foods come out quite fast but not all at once (common thing with sushi).

This time there were 8 of us eating there. Again, we waited for about 5-10 min before we receive our green tea, and many 10 more minute before anyone come to ask if we are ready to order. I ordered 3 rolls for myself including, chop scallop roll (5.95), Edmonton roll (6.95) and Queen's roll (13.95?). All in all we ordered about 18 dishes or something along that line. I found that the price here is decent for the size and quality of the food here. In general their presentation is still lacking and thus sometime the sushi rice can come off when pick up or tobiko can be all over the place. However their flavour is the real deal. Today I will be reviewing couple of dishes I had.

Takoyaki

Beef Tataki

Whether because we order so much, or because they remember me or might be the power of my camera, they gave us free foods! First they start of with miso soup (which is normal), then they brought 2 serving of beef tataki! We were all surprise and frankly was confuse and question ourselves if we order beef tataki (raw beef with marinated sauce). The server quickly told us "on the house, on the house". We were even more surprise when they brought out two serving of takoyaki (fried octopus ball)! Oh my! Big brownie point for this review :D. Furthermore, this wasn't the first time we get this kind of service. Last time I went there (group of 4), we also got free serving of takoyaki.

( ￣∀￣)o彡ﾟ

Edmonton Roll - $6.95 (8/10) - above

This is a combination of tempura, spicy tuna, and crab (imitated). I am a fan of spicy tuna, and a fan of tempura so this roll is perfect for me. The prawn tempura is crunchy which add that texture to the roll, while spicy tuna add more flavour. (I am not a fan of imitated crab therefore im not going to say anything here lol) For the price this is a pretty good roll. Its about half the size of the big fancy roll. I personally like the half size portion better because then I can try many things :D

Queen's Rolls - $13.95 (8/10) - above

This is a very interesting dish both in term of presentation and combination of ingredient. The description in the menu said "Prawn tempura, smoke salmon, crab, tobiko". I did not expect two kind of smoke salmon o(✿⊙ω⊙)o. When the dish was serve, first thing you notice is the salmon flower right in the middle of the dish surrounded by tempura roll topped with smoke salmon and tobiko. The salmon in the middle is salmon sashimi that been bundle up and 'smoke' with blow torch. The sushi roll itself is very good too, and the smoke salmon on top added a very nice taste to the tempura. Highly recommended.

Chop Scallop roll - $5.95 (5.5/10) - above

Not much to say about this dish. The scallop is chopped, mixed with mayo and tobiko. This is an okay dish, it was good to try once, and I will probably not get it again. To be honest, the favour of mayo overflavour that of scallop.

Empty miso soup bowl

About the free food we got:

Miso Soup - very good soup, but I wish that there are more green onion and tofu.

Beef tataki - another very good dish, better than many other place in edmonton, the beef was fresh and the sauce is very good.

Takoyaki - Here's the thing, takoyaki is one of my FAVOURITE food. The best takoyaki I ever had was made by my friend. Takoyaki at Kabuki is ..... alright. The batter is good, sauce is good, and they fried it pretty well BUT where is my tako? the octopus was so small ლ｜￣o￣ლ｜