Charcoal Sushi & BBQ Restaurant Richmond

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Charcoal Sushi & BBQ Restaurant Richmond

June 20, 2014 by Joyce

Mr. and I were in the mood for some sushi but I wanted something more delicate, so we ditched the obvious option in BanZai and ventured out to another sushi restaurant – Charcoal Sushi.

It’s more than sushi at Charcoal. You can also order Korean BBQ here with lots of meat options for grilling. Not wanting something too heavy, we stuck with the original sushi idea.

Food

We didn’t order too many dishes, only a couple of rolls and tempura. My must-have sushi, Chopped Scallop Roll, was quite good. It didn’t have the fishy taste that some may have, and the chopped scallops weren’t overdressed. It had a good rice-to-chopped-scallop ratio.

Then we wanted something more interesting, so we ordered the Charcoal Roll. It has prawn tempura, spicy tuna, then topped with a thin slice of avocado and salmon and drizzles of wasabi mayo and teriyaki sauce. The two sauces struck a good balance between spicy, salty and sweet; the crispy prawn tempura, mushy spicy tuna and crunchy tobiko also gave you a good variety of texture within the sushi roll. Overall I thought this was a very enjoyable roll.

Lastly, the Assorted Tempura was freshly prepared and it didn’t go unnoticed. Every piece was piping hot and fried to a nice crispy texture. The batter wasn’t very thick so you can still enjoy the flavour of the prawns and vegetables. It included 2 pieces each of Japanese pumpkin, yam and sweet potatoes, as well as 3 prawns, which I thought was a generous portion. The dipping sauce was also hot, which helped keep the food hot, and it had a hint of ginger taste.

Service

You know how sometimes you have no idea what a dish looks like even though they include a description? Fear not, here at Charcoal they actually have a photo album of most of their dishes so you know what they look like and know what to expect.

The restaurant sits around 50-60 people and they only had 2 servers on a Friday night, plus kitchen staff. Kudos to the front of house for keeping up with the speedy and organized service.

Final Thoughts

The food here at Charcoal Sushi is more expensive than, say, BanZai, but the dishes have more finesse and they do offer more varieties. The photo album was very enticing and I’m tempted to go back again.

Charcoal Sushi & BBQ Restaurant
250-7997 Westminster Highway, Richmond
778-297-7255