Sunday, February 13, 2011

Sushi at Kamei Royale

Saturday February 12, was to be Kevin's belated birthday dinner.  The venue chosen was Kamei Royale self touted to be the largest sushi restaurant in Vancouver, and one of the few Japanese restaurants when it was established in the 1970's.  Located on West Georgia on the 2nd floor it certainly looked appealing let's see if it lives up to it's hype.


One reason for this venue was the inclusion of  karaoke lounge as our original plan had us watching the hockey game at one venue and then moving to a karaoke bar.



California Rolls - Well nothing special tasted like half decent California Rolls, nothing special about the presentation but didn't really wow me either.  I get the same quality of from the sushi place down the street at work and at the "All you can eat" joints, and definitely inferior to what I can get at Sushi Garden or California Sushi.  6/10


Chicken Karage - Deep fried boneless chicken meat, this was quite tasty especially after squeezing lemon juice all over it.  I was surprised by the portion size as after seeing the California Roll I was preparing myself to dig up the menu to order a 3rd item for dinner.  Everything was lightly battered and not overly oily. 8/10


Beef Udon Noodles - I debated taking a picture of this dish and decided against it. Presentation wise it was quite appealing on first inspection with the forged iron bowl (like a mini cauldron), upon tasting it was quite the opposite.  The beef was overcooked and tough, the enoki mushrooms were cold and well the noodles were soggy in texture.  The only redeeming quality was the broth which was very full of flavor and quite tasty (MSG soup?) 4/10


Concluding notes - Our group of 12 took up a fairly large section of the karaoke lounge and there were few other people around.  It took a fair bit of time for the servers to come around and provide tea/water.  After the orders were placed there was a really noticeable delay between when the different dishes arrived.  Andrea sitting on my right got her 2 plates of various sushi rolls/sashimi all at once whereas the other people at our table had to wait upwards of 30 to 40 minutes for their sushi boat to arrive.  One person mentioned that they were not even hungry by the time their sushi boat arrived.  All in all I have had better sushi at a better price at other venues and would not recommend this restaurant for a sushi night out.

2 comments:

  1. Have you been to Mandala IKI Asian Bistro on 4th? We went tonight and it was quite good. I don't eat sushi that often so I don't have as much experience as others but it was solid in my eyes.

    I prefer to use the wine scale and will give Mandala a solid 90+ rating. :)

    Rob

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  2. No I haven't Rob, but will definitely give it a shot if I am in the area.

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