Izumi Sushi restaurant review

Hi, has anyone tried this sushi restaurant? Please let me know your experience and quality of the food.

Thank you!

Excellent, service is great and food is fresh. What ship are you going on?

The sushi, sashimi and rolls are decent and are comparable to any run of the mill Japanese sushi restaurant on land. However their ramen/udon leave a lot to be desired.

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I liked the sushi, husband liked the tempura. Went there for lunch. Have not done hibachi there.

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I'm going to be the dissenting voice here. I've been to Izumi's on Grandeur and Anthem and I wasn't terribly impressed, considering its a for fee restaurant. Not like Chops, Giovanni's or Wonderland.

I found the sushi to be mediocre, but better than the free stuff they offered previously.

Hi, has anyone tried this sushi restaurant? Please let me know your experience and quality of the food.

 

Thank you!

its not Tokyo good, but it is one the best outside of Japan we have experienced.

I love the Hot Rock plates. Mr Spook goes to town on the nigiri.

I find the offerings have been eliminated/downgraded over time. No more filet for the hot rock, no more sukiyaki, only one tempura choice, no combo meals.

Hi, has anyone tried this sushi restaurant? Please let me know your experience and quality of the food.

 

Thank you!

Like with most things on RCCL varies from ship to ship and sometimes from night to night, loved it on several trips on Navigator and it was terrible on Brilliance

We ate at Izumi on the Brilliance recently and thoroughly enjoyed it! I did a short trip review and included pictures of the menu and a couple of the rolls. Service was very good too.

We did the Izumi Hibachi on the Harmony. Thought it was excellent and.....a lot of fun!

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If you like rice and veggies...can't go wrong.

But....don't expect a ship that stocks food at the beginning of a cruise

to have daily super fresh fish like most good sushi restaurants....unless

those sushi chefs are fishing off of the aft deck ;) :p

...it's thawed from frozen fish which is a bit mushy.

I have had sushi twice at the Sushi side of Izumi. Once on the Oasis and once on the Allure. The actual quality of the sushi was good. Was it amongst the best sushi I have ever had, no. The draw back was the lack of service. On our Allure cruise last year, I had to almost tackle a manager to get even a drink order in.

On the Teppanaki side I can't address the sushi service.

My wife and I tried Izumi on our Serenade cruise in December. She likes sushi and I don't. I tried to give the restaurant a chance, I had read a lot of people saying the hot rock food is good. The hot rock food was okay, but if I'm paying an extra fee for food on a cruise I'd rather go somewhere that I don't have to cook the food and I can get food that is better than just "okay". My wife enjoyed it as much as Chops and Giovanni's though, so if you like sushi it's worth a try.

I was on Oasis over Christmas and sushi in Izumi was an interesting experience. Most important, we all thought the sushi was very good. The service we had was so bad it had the 4 of us in stitches the whole time. Examples but I am sure I have forgot a couple. First, we were pretty sure the waiter apologized for the service we were about to have that evening, he kind of mumbled but that was our consensus. The orders were literally piling up in front of the chefs and no one was even trying to get them to tables. The chefs were noticeably agitated by this. Our waiter was either no where to be seen or always at his "computer". Manager was doing nothing but walking around, not helping with expediting orders even though hearing from angry chefs. Their counter was full of orders and no one was taking them. Halfway through service, someone started to fill up our waters. He ran out of water halfway on the first glass and said he would be right back. You guessed it, he was never seen again and neither was any water. Another waiter took a Sapporo order from me, came back after a while and said they were out of Sapporo. After a "wow it's only the 4th night of the cruise" from me he says "well we only have about 6 left would you like one of those?". "Ah yeah sure", he returns later with no beer and "can I get you something else?"...."OK, Kirin please". Was not that crowded but I did see a couple people going up to sushi bar and seeing if that was their order sitting there.

If you like rice and veggies...can't go wrong.

 

But....don't expect a ship that stocks food at the beginning of a cruise

to have daily super fresh fish like most good sushi restaurants....unless

those sushi chefs are fishing off of the aft deck ;) :p

...it's thawed from frozen fish which is a bit mushy.

Fresh when it comes to sushi is a bit of a misnomer:

For fish that contain parasites, the FDA provides guidance under their Parasite Destruction Guarantee. This states in part that fish intended to be consumed raw must be “frozen and stored at a temperature of -20°C (-4°F) or below for a minimum of 168 hours (7 days)”.

Most ALL raw fish you get at a reputable sushi restaurant has been "deep" frozen to meet the FDA recommendations.

You could go to a top sushi restaurant on two different nights, order the same thing and find the fish to be incredibly different in texture and taste. Its very common when eating well Anything at all.

Have done Izumi on both Oasis sailings I was on and have to say that both experiences were near perfect.

I live mostly in Chicago where high end sushi is common and I've eaten sushi over 500 times in my life (I used to live nearly next door to a premium sushi joint and they'd give me 50% off all the time). So my knowledge of sushi is pretty good.

The hibachi is "OK" but we did it with a big family gathering with young toddlers and grandma and everyone had a blast and the chef accommodated a 5 year old who only eats pizza -- and the kid loved it.

The sushi itself was really great considering we're on a ship with no daily deliveries. I'm a sashimi fanatic and the sashimi platter was huge, the fish tasted very fresh, and the overall presentation was elegant. Service was fast.

We liked it so much on our last Oasis cruise that we did it twice, in fact.

Service was quick all 5 visits (2 hibachi, 3 sushi) and the only complaint I had was the misplacement of an opened wine bottle (GF and I don't really drink on cruises, so we did 2/5 of a bottle with sushi and then the bottle went missing for 2 nights after). That was dealt with just fine, though, so no major complaint really.

We're trying to book an Allure cruise for this year still, and we will definitely do Izumi again and hope it's as consistent as Oasis was.

We have the 4 night dinner package for our upcoming Harmony cruise. We plan on going to Izumi for one of the nights. I know the Hibachi is not included and we need to order off the regular sushi menu.

I understand we each have $30 to spend on the menu for dinner included with the dining package. Is this correct?

Is the Hot Rock Steak included in this?

Thanks in advance and for any additional information regarding the dining package.

We have the 4 night dinner package for our upcoming Harmony cruise. We plan on going to Izumi for one of the nights. I know the Hibachi is not included and we need to order off the regular sushi menu.

 

 

 

I understand we each have $30 to spend on the menu for dinner included with the dining package. Is this correct?

 

 

 

Is the Hot Rock Steak included in this?

 

 

 

Thanks in advance and for any additional information regarding the dining package.

You can use your $30/package allowance in sushi or teppanyaki restaurants. And you can use the allowance anyway (food) you want.

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Fresh when it comes to sushi is a bit of a misnomer:

 

For fish that contain parasites, the FDA provides guidance under their Parasite Destruction Guarantee. This states in part that fish intended to be consumed raw must be “frozen and stored at a temperature of -20°C (-4°F) or below for a minimum of 168 hours (7 days)”.

 

Most ALL raw fish you get at a reputable sushi restaurant has been "deep" frozen to meet the FDA recommendations.

 

You could go to a top sushi restaurant on two different nights, order the same thing and find the fish to be incredibly different in texture and taste. Its very common when eating well Anything at all.

Top sushi restaurant? Where??? Inland Texas?

OK..my local sushi chef...would be horrified to see your post. :eek: We are on

the banks of the sea where ...yes...OMG..fresh NOT frozen fish is offered for

consumption. :eek: :eek

We are are local port with fresh fish coming in each day. And if you were to go to

Hawaii...be prepared to have them come at you with flaming pitch forks for your

comments. :eek: :p

So...you go to Louisiana...and order what... frozen oysters? :p :p

It's an "average" Japanese/teppanyaki/sushi restaurant. Nothing more. It's perfectly decent and if you are in the mood, you will most certainly enjoy it. If you have never done teppanyaki, you may enjoy the experience quite a bit.

If you are traveling out of Miami/Fort Lauderdale and want to visit one of the best Japanese restaurants in America - we have that here. Just book well ahead of time and plan on spending $300+ per person - and being open to very unusual items. But they overnight fresh fish from Japanese markets. The restaurant is called NAOE.

Martin is right. Almost all sushi in the US is frozen per FDA guidelines.

Top sushi restaurant? Where??? Inland Texas?

 

OK..my local sushi chef...would be horrified to see your post. :eek: We are on

the banks of the sea where ...yes...OMG..fresh NOT frozen fish is offered for

consumption. :eek: :eek

 

We are are local port with fresh fish coming in each day. And if you were to go to

Hawaii...be prepared to have them come at you with flaming pitch forks for your

comments. :eek: [emoji14]

 

So...you go to Louisiana...and order what... frozen oysters? [emoji14] :p

You are certainly a lot more brave than most if you literally eat raw never frozen fish...If you have never got sick that's great for you and your horrified sushi chef.

https://munchies.vice.com/en/articles/almost-every-kind-of-wild-fish-is-infected-with-worms

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its not Tokyo good, but it is one the best outside of Japan we have experienced.

My experience was very different. I've had sushi at a variety of places in Japan including at the famous sukiyabashi jiro; I think this gives me a benchmark against which I can measure good sushi. Izumi is not on the same planet as good sushi.

Compared to normal mall-counter sushi in NZ (the mass-market everyone-is-happy option) the nigiri at Izumi is inferior in terms of freshness and taste; compared to a restaurant at the same price point as Izumi the nigiri is terrible. I'm convinced the salmon roe I was served had been frozen - either that or they were the saddest looking roe I've seen in my life.

Presentation was adequate but below average for a restaurant trying to be a little bit special. Some laziness was apparent though. For example, going back to my roe example the piece of seaweed surrounding the rice and supporting the row didn't go all the way around - the gap was perhaps half a cm. The knife work was generally sloppy too with none of the fish cut to a eye-pleasing shape. The eel in particular looked unappealing with a long flap of soggy skin drooping off the end of its piece of rice onto the plate.

The ramen was bad - the soup simply lacked any real flavour (it tasted of hot water with a hint of chilli added). The noodles were of the quality you get in the fridge of any Asian shop.

The hot stone was fine but then there is no skill needed to heat a stone and then provide the guest with some slices of fillet steak to cook themselves. The fried rice that came with it was cold, stale, and tasteless.

The roll sushi was mediocre and suffered from the ingredients not being fresh.

It's the sort of Japanese food you'd not buy twice unless you had to. If compared to a land restaurant I'd give it 2 out of 5.

Compared to the buffet food Izumi was absolutely fantastic; but clearly I'm not being complementary here.

This was on Explorer.

We've eaten at Izumi a few times on different ships. In general we like the food - it isn't the greatest Japanese food we've ever eaten but it is fine and a nice change from some of the 'heavier' options elsewhere on the ships. On our most recent Navigator cruise, we ate there twice for dinner plus I did the 'sushi course' which was a lot of fun and gave us a lovely and large lunch (one person could do the course watched by family/friends and then share the results - cost for one person $30).

My DH didn't think he liked sushi but he changed his mind after eating at Izumis.

Presently on Oasis we dined at the hibachi grill in Izumi as part of our four restaurant dining package last night. It was great fun! We were seated with a family with young children and it was great to see them enjoy the show!

The food was absolutely fine, fine dining no, but value for money for tasty food and a 'performance' absolutely!