JUKAI Japanese & Thai — Restaurant in Dartmouth

Yikes.

Thought we'd give this place a try at lunch time not having been in years (which was decent then).

First thing we're greeted by the host and told that they've discontinued all-you-can-eat lunch (due to increases in food costs). You can still have all-you-can-eat but it's the dinner price, which seemed exorbitant for how much I'd be eating for lunch ($28 I think?)

We ordered from the menu; I had three different spicy rolls (salmon, tuna, butterfish) and my spouse had pad thai. Pad thai, which was a very good size, was generally greasy and heavy (but a good price I suppose, $11.99).

Here's my disclaimer, we've been eating at the sushi nami in Dartmouth Crossing for a while now and perhaps I've become accustomed to their excellence. Whether it was due to a superior comparison or just objectively on its own, the result is that the sushi from Jukai is paltry (big pieces of fish flesh, salmon did not have the look of 'sushi grade', strange taste in the crunch component, and something hard in the butterfish I had to remove from my mouth (sorry for the visuals)).

Had to pay for parking (though only $0.70) but still a nuisance.

We won't be going back here. I will say, I know someone who will only go here for their takeout sushi - so perhaps I caught Jukai on a bad day (or it's me having a snobby bad day). The prices of the usual sushi (e.g. spicy whatever) seem to be priced exactly the same as Nami i.e. I think they're direct competitors. If you haven't tried Nami, I highly recommend that's where you go. It's certainly where I'll be.

Two stars because of the decent view...

I ordered pad Thai for myself and my daughter for takeout last night (June 7th.)

When I arrived, they were saying that I had not placed an order there, and perhaps it was the other location.

I said no, it was kings warf and told them exactly what time it was ordered. They found the order in their system, and apologized that it wasn’t ready.

I said no trouble, we have to go to an event so we will just get a refund. They had to talk to their manager and said it would be refunded.

I check my account this morning, it still hadn’t been refunded. After phoning four times when they opened and phones not being answered, myself and my daughter went back down.

The server was arguing with me that the refund would be issues through the bank in 3-5 days. I explained that I’ve had refunds issued on the same day within minutes from other places. She was arguing with me, saying they would not refund me through their debit terminal.

I was getting annoyed at this point, after ten minutes of going back and forth. I said this is ridiculous, you’re refusing to give me a refund for a service that was supposed to be provided.

Finally after discussing with her coworkers behind the kitchen line, they told her she could issue me a refund over the debit terminal. She returned and told me I would be losing 11% of the cost.

I said absolutely not. This was your guys mistake, I’m not losing money for your debit terminal service fees.

Finally, disgruntled, she offered to give me cash.

As a business owner myself, this is absolutely horrible...

We recently tried take out from Jukai. The food was very pretty, it was very clear that significant attention went into designing the presentation of each dish.

Absolute top marks for being some of the prettiest food I have seen.

For us, sushi is really about the quality of the dishes and not how photogenic they are. Especially the rice. A quality sushi rice should have a complementary acidity as well as a richness that melds with and enhances the flavour of the fish.

On that note.

The sushi rice was bland, it had no dimension or richness compared to rice prepared with a dash of dashi or even some kombu broth. It also lacked sufficient acidity to really set off the flavours of the fish.

Given that Jukai seems to specialize in uramaki fusion rolls, I assume that this is done intentionally as bland rice better suits such fusion rolls. It makes for a disappointing performance on the traditional sushi.

The spider roll was particularly disappointing. It had a single legs worth of soft shelled crab with the remainder being artificial crab. I've never had nor seen such a nonsensical implementation of a roll that should have a good portion or whole crab contained in it - usually with the claws and legs protruding from the ends of the roll, thus giving the roll its name.

If your intention is to eat food that looks great on social media or your tastes are simple, nothing wrong with that, then Jukai is probably perfect for you.

In our opinion, this is not an inspired and quality focused resturant, it is highly...