Toyo Sushi - A New-ish Sushi Spot
I think I might have mentioned that I LOVE Japanese food and I am always on the hunt for new and delicious places. So you can imagine my enthusiasm when Toyo Sushi opened about a year ago within walking distance from where I lived. One of my friends raved about how fresh and authentic everything was. I went there, tried the food and it was amazing. Unfortunately, less than a week later, they closed for unknown reason. Months passed with no sign of activity from the restaurant - until now. Toyo recently re-opened and I grabbed a couple of friends and sprinted there for dinner.
I should note three things about Toyo. First thing I will mention is that this is a small restaurant. There’s probably 4-5 tables plus the sushi bar. Second thing is that they also don’t have any high chairs, so large families or families with young children should be aware. Our friends had a toddler but thankfully she was able to sit on a regular chair on her own. Lastly, it’s only open for dinner. Now that that’s out of the way, let’s move on to the food.
Toyo has a relatively traditional menu. You will not find any crazy rolls here. Instead, you’ll find a vast array of fresh sashimi that you won’t typically find at your average sushi restaurant. I had to google most of the items on their daily menu. Apart from sashimi/nigiri, they also have a wide selection of appetizers (one of the few places with an egg custard appy) and hot entrees.
Chanwanmushi/Egg Custard
We started with chicken karaage (fried chicken), chawanmushi (savoury egg custard), ika butter (whole grilled squid) and vegetable tempura. The chicken karaage was crispy on the outside and super juicy on the inside. It also had a lot of flavours, which is exactly what I want from my chicken karaage and it would go perfectly with a cold beer. Next was the chawanmushi. I grew up with a version of this steamed savoury egg custard and it’s always been one of my favourite things at dinner. I love trying chawanmushi at different restaurants to see what they’ve included in their version. In this chawanmushi, there’s mushrooms, pieces of chicken, shrimp and ginko fruit, so dig in for all the goodies! While we were eating the chawanmushi, the ika butter and the tempura arrived. The ika butter was cooked really well, the squid was soft but still had a bounce/bite to it and you can definitely taste the soy sauce butter. Nothing worst than an under cooked or rubbery squid. The tempura came out hot and was comprised of a variety of seasoned vegetables. There were asparagus, sweet potato, broccoli, carrot, mushroom, bell pepper and beans. They were just lightly battered and all the ingredients tasted fresh. Word of caution, like the chicken karaage, it came out really hot so be careful when you’re first biting in.
Chicken Karaage/Fried Boneless Chicken
Ika Butter/Whole Grilled Squid
Vegetable Tempura
Obviously, to truly try a sushi restaurant, we need to try some sushi and sashimi. We ordered the 5 kind assorted sashimi, 6 pieces of the aburi saba oshi sushi, 6 pieces of aburi sockeye salmon oshi sushi, and just for pure scientific curiosity, we ordered the regular negitoro roll and the blue fin tuna negitoro roll. The 5 kinds of assorted sashimi consisted of tuna, wild salmon, hamachi, sweet prawn and saba. The size of the sashimi was evenly cut and what you would normally expect, I was disappointed that the saba was quite chopped up. I am not sure if this is intentional but it gave an appearance that these were left over pieces from rolls or sushi. The two aburi orders arrived on the same plate. The aburi sushi had very generous portions of fish and each piece was larger than what I’ve seen at most other restaurants. That being said, each order is also $17.00 so it kind of evens out. We were really happy that the blue fin tuna negitoro and the regular negitoro arrived at the same time. As you can see in the pictures, the two negitoro rolls look completely different. The blue fin tuna is more than double the price but basically tasted the same. There is a noticeable difference in the texture. The blue fin tuna was a bit more silky and buttery than the regular negitoro. I personally don’t think it’s worth the extra price. If you want to eat blue fin tuna, you should go for a nigiri or sashimi instead.
5 Kind Assorted Sashimi
Aburi Saba Oshi Sushi and Aburi Sockeye Salmon Oshi Sushi
Negitoro Roll
Bluefin Tuna Negitoro Roll
Overall, I would say that Toyo Sushi is a great place to visit if you’re looking for a higher quality, traditional sushi/Japanese food. If you’re looking for something quick, cheap or innovative, this is not the place for you. I personally enjoy googling the fish on their daily special menu and would highly recommend that you give Toyo Sushi a try.
