Osechi Japanese - Toronto

For dinner we went out for some all you can eat sushi.  This gave us a good opportunity to compare the all you can eat sushi market in Markham and Ottawa.  Dad found a good deal here and it was well recommended.  We easily found this place and when walked in, the décor was very modern.  It has nice dark colors with some brighter pink and reds and glass beads separating some of the sections of the room.  At the far back, was the sushi making area and one more private room where instead of chairs, there were cushions on the floor.  Very nice addition, albeit, I am sure sitting there can be very uncomfortable!

We menu had a good selection of things that were raw and cooked.  The boss and I ordered more of the raw fish as my parents went the route of the cooked fish.  The food came very quickly and everything was very fresh.  The sashimi had our favourite, white tuna which came in generous portions.  Everything we did order came, which is always an added bonus when coming to an all you can eat sushi place.  The price was about 22$ per person, which is about just below the cost of what it is here in Ottawa.  One of the things on the menu that was not "standard fare" when it comes to all you can eat sushi was a white arctic roll that had some smoked flakes on the top.  The flaked were on a roll that had white tuna in it, which gave the already delicious fish some smokey flavour.  For desert, they had a decent selection of asian ice creams such as, red bean, and sesame flavoured.  It was a black coloured ice cream that did not have much flavour at first, and then you get a nice aroma of sesame after.  Delicious!  

Once again on our trip, the service was not good.  The staff looked like robots, who walked around delivering food and clearing plates.  Not ONCE did I see a server smile.  When they dropped off food, or cleared off some plates, we would say "thank you" which they would with an expressionless look just say, "ok".

The décor was nice, the food was good, but the service and the gloomy expressions on their faces really dampened the experience.  I am not asking for super happy with a fake smile, but a small smile once in a while would have been appreciated.  The menu was good but pretty much standard fare, and the price was ok, but when you add on the type of service, I would not revisit this place.

Review (out of 5):

Food: * * * 1/2

Value: * * *  

Atmosphere: * * * 

Service: * 1/2

Price Range: $22 - $25

Sushi in Albany

In one of our trips down to visit some relatives in the US, we stopped over in Albany, NY over might to break up our drive. We had a craving for sushi or Japanese, so when we got to the hotel, we looked up for ideas. One of the places that came up close to the hotel was Koto. This was a habatchi and sushi place just off the highway.  It took us a little while to find it due to my lack of trusting my GPS, but we eventually made it there.  It was late, around 8pm, but it was still pretty busy there.  There was a nice Koi pond to greet you, with a very nice Japanese atmosphere.  We got seated at the back and the service was good.  It was what I would expect anywhere, but nothing special.  Looking at the menu, and it being so late, we ended up ordering a lot of sushi.

We wanted to try out things we did not have back home, so we ended up ordering rolls like the "fool's gold", "black out roll" which involved fish like Chilean sea bass, or combinations of crab, shrimp, avocado, tuna and black tobiko.  As you can see below the presentation was very well done.  I was a little sad not to see the wooden boat, but they did make an effort on this plate to make it look extra special.  As you can also see, there was a lot of food here.  We thought we would get 6 small pieces of sushi, but when it arrived, they were HUGE rolls.  The sushi was very fresh, and the combination of the "chef's special rolls" we ordered was very well put together.  Nothing really came out that we did not like.

We did not try out their habatchi section as we did have our craving for sushi, so I cannot speak of it at all.

Overall, even with the atmosphere, the good size of the rolls and the decent quality, nothing jumped out to wow us.  Why that matters is the price.  We felt that the price was very high for what we did end up getting. I do understand that getting fresh fish in Albany may not be the easiest, it still does have an effect the overall meal when you know what you're ordering is so expensive.  If you can get a deal, discount, or coupon to go here, it can be very worth it, but for us, we did not feel the price matched the food and we will probablly not be going back.

Review (out of 5):

Food: * * * 1/2

Value: * * 1/2

Atmosphere: * * * 1/2

Service: * * * 1/2

Price Range: $8 - $25

Website: http://www.kotoalbany.com/