Sushi K Kamizato — Restaurant in Port Coquitlam

WAS The best sushi ever!!! We used to order a lot and average spend $100- 150 per person. We used to drive all the way for the special Keith style sushi until our last worst omakase experience that was a rip off $300 for two with non authentic omakase. The wife also requested a credit card over the phone to reserve for omakase and $100 charge if we didn’t show up!

With the regular sushi being so good we expected more show off of keith style surprise. But it was a huge disappointment as Keith had nothing else to show off. We should have sticked to regular sushi we usually order that fish were imported from Japan. We had actually experienced real omakase in Japan and other authentic Japanese restaurants, and what is served to us is not authentic omakase but gimmick to make more money with low cost of what we were served was lots of unfresh rice to fill you up and salmon.

Despite Due to only one server - the wife and only Keith himself- one sushi chef- challenged to create sushi faster, and wife stressed to serve so many customers while handling all by only herself- she lacked smiling and attention to customers, their were 2 hour long waits, that was even fine with us as we used to love the food. We used to suck it up and tolerated these flaws while it was common that guests walked out after being seated and waited too long.

However, it was the wrong choice to call in to tell the wife that we had a budget about $100 each person for omakase which we ended getting very poor value ( lots of rice and salmon) for $300.00 IT WAS A HUGE DISSAPOINTMENT. Regularly spending $300 non omakase we were extremely full. But we were still hungry with the so-called omakase. Their wasn’t even hot soup to finish the omakase and we had to pay extra for the soup.

We regret going for omakase. We should have stayed with ordering the imported fish sushi from japan... but well too late as we found other competitors that offer even better genuine Japanese food... go for the regular sushi- skip omakase.

If you want real omakase go to Tojo’s on broadway, despite it was even more pricey $450 at Tojo’s, but it was worth it! They give you mainly fresh imported sashimi from Japan and not cheap rice with regular salmon! Tojo showed off his skill of sushi creation. if you want good omakase surprise, go to Tojo’s. btw, their seafood type cones are the best. The seaweed is crisp when served. You have not experienced eating what real cones are unless you try Tojo’s. They make sure you are full and satisfied.

Another place with fresh variety of imported fish from Japan with cheaper and better Engawa also charcoal sealed, bigger slices, oilier that melts in your mouth and even more variety of imported fresh fish from Japan with same style charcoaled sushi, sushi with special sauce, is Tsujiri Richmond.

We get the full blown grand style Japanese sashimi experience while we order the whole Japan imported shimaaji fish ($110-120) with other imported Japanese fish that we order slices of sashimi and sushi. We were surprised to find this gem in Richmond that is actually better than Kamizato. We used to believe Kamizato was the best sushi place in Vancouver but not anymore.

Tsujuri has a much bigger selection of imported fresh Japanese fish on a daily basis and opens to 12am daily. Not cheap at Tsujiri but worth with very friendly service, no long waits for best quality Japanese sashimi.

Sadly, we will not be going back to Kamizato anymore despite the past this WAS the best sushi place until we felt being ripped off by our last omakase experience. We also spend between about $250 for two at Tsujiri but it is real grand style 5 star Japanese experience.

Simply put, if you are near Kamizato, order imported Japan fish sushi and Keith style sushi is still the best out there. But avoid omakase! But it’s pricier than Tsujuri for similar or less quality.But if you want real omakase, Tojo’s is one of the best in Vancouver, but quite $$$$ but still worth. If you want real Grand prix Japan style sushi, Tsujuri is the place to go. Not cheap, but...

I really wanted to give 5 stars like so many others have, but I felt the experience overall didn’t quite live up to the hefty price tag.

Quality of the fish: superb. Fresh, melt-in-your-mouth delicious. This is where they excel.

Variety: this is one area that could have been better. We opted for the $150 Omakase (middle tier) and I felt there were too many tuna dishes. There were some very unique and tasty offerings interspersed, but not as many as I would expect from an omakase 13-piece nigiri experience for the price point.

Portion: the nigiri was constructed delicately with the right ratio of rice-to-fish. Because there was less rice, we all felt a bit hungry at the end. For $150 pp, that was disappointing. Maybe a few more non-sushi options in between or a small rice bowl with select fish on top would have helped.

Flavours: overall mild, and highlighting the natural flavours of the fish. The tuna karaage and marinated sockeye were too salty, but otherwise the rest were nicely balanced. The torching enhanced many of the fattier fish. Strangely, most of the nigiri was served with wasabi.

Atmosphere: loved the metal theme. I actually thought this could have been more immersive. The music was relatively quiet and I would have preferred a livelier ambience. The chef's counter experience seemed much more personal; at the table, we felt less included in the conversations but that's just the reality of having one chef and one small counter area.

Service: a bit slower than we would have liked but this was expected and made clear up front. The chef did come over at the end of the meal which was nice, and took a photo with us. I wish more information was given about each fish and where it was sourced.

Price: this was the hardest thing for me to get past. The price per piece of nigiri was over $10. This may be justified with a generous piece of fish that is harder to source in Vancouver but several of the nigiri featured fish that could easily be found here. Maybe it's a quality thing? I'm not sure. I'm someone who will break the bank for life-changing bites, but the overall experience didn't quite get there for me. If this had been priced $80-90, I think my rating would be...

Overpriced AND unclear rule about pricing. They ask you what your budget is and tell you a price after you informing them of your budget instead of telling you the exact price tiers upfront. They claim that there are different tiers of pricing based on "what seafood they get" and the "current set of menu" but they couldn't explicitly list what exactly are different (for example, which items caused the increase in the price) among the different prices. Also, I looked at the review from a year ago, they served the exact same set of sushi!!! Their menu hasn't changed, so it's a total lie that they charge you according to their current available seafood collection because they've been ordering the same things. They only say it ranges from $80 to $150 per person so they charge whatever in between and give you whatever they want for the price that they charge you. Sushi are either drenched in soy sauce or mayo and have a very cheap Western style flavor. Flavor-wise, almost every sushi tastes the same, it's just the texture of the meat that was different. It's almost like since the seafood are imported, they could just get away with being lazy about flavoring. They used horseradish instead of wasabi. It has the same taste and spiciness as the ones out of a tube from a grocery store. Rice were half cold and half hot and they were not short grain sushi rice. Dining pace was all over the place, the chef was trying to serve 4 tables with a total of 10+ people, so he was super busy trying to get food to everyone. Each dish was not served at a consistent pace - sometimes the waittime is around a minute and other times around 10 minutes. The total dining time was more than 1.5 hours for 10 pieces of sushi. Aside from the food, the chef and the server were very friendly to customers. The interior decoration resembles your neighborhood sushi shop where you order $10 california rolls for take-out. There's no open-kitchen practice where every customer gets to see what exactly the chef is doing - something you generally expect from an omakase restaurant that charges you...