I had a lot of high hopes for this place. It's gotten rave reviews on many blogs for its fresh fish flown in directly from the fish markets in Tokyo and it's affordable options. Compared to my last sushi obsession, the vibe here is more upscale and sleeker. None the less, I was excited to try it out with my mom visiting as they had great looking lunch specials - much fancier than the usual 3 roll combo.
The crowd definitely caters to the business crowd, which makes sense given it's Grand Central location. Unfortunately we didn't get there early enough to snag one of the 5 Wokuni-Don bowls, but I'm not really sure why there are only 5 available all day since it's just assorted sashimi with shrimp tempura. In any case, my mom and I started with the fried tofu in dashi broth ($8) and both got the kaisen-don($18), which was 4 kinds of assorted sashimi, spicy tartare and ikura. In retrospect, we shouldn't have gotten the same thing and one of us should have gotten the bara chirashi, which was also $18 and while it's also 4 kinds of fish, the presentation of it was much cooler and it would have been nice to try something different.
The tofu was delicious - lightly fried and fantastically paired with the dashi. I love silken tofu and it's a great start to any meal. Unfortunately, this is where things go downhill. We waited and waited and waiter for our entrees to show and they never did. People seated to the left and right of us, who all came later than us got their entire meals before we did. I had to flag down the waiter several times and he apologized profusely for it and eventually after almost 40 mins we got our food. You could tell the restaurant was still going through growing pains or lacked some kind of operational efficiency as other tables were complaining of the same thing. When we finally got our food, it was definitely fresh and of quality fish but I was so pissed that I couldn't really enjoy my meal properly.
While I know it wasn't the waiters fault and he was clearly embarrassed, there was no attempt to offer anything as a compensation for the wait. I'm not looking for them to comp our our whole but some kind of acknowledgement like a drink or another appetizer while we waited would have been nice. What frustrated me the most was that the waiter didn't even realize we didn't get our food - I had to point it out a few times for him. In the end, if the service kinks are worked out, I would be open to going again but there are so many sushi places in NYC, that's hard for me to motivate. Total bill: $60 for 2 people with tax and tip
Photo Credit: Yelp
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