Amakara Japan — Restaurant in St. Catharines

Been here numerous times over the years, going on over 15. I've brought multiple sushi loving friends here over the years, and the general consensus is they've enjoyed it.

I've tried nearly every sushi place in the Niagara region and by far Amakara is the best quality sushi you can get for the price. Amakara is NOT an all you can eat place. AYCE sushi places use low quality sushi and limit the menu to what you can order. Also this is the only place I know of that wets their seaweed wrap for their hand rolls and it makes a major difference in the flavor. (tastes better)

If you enjoy a mass amount of Nigiri and Sashimi then I recommend going with a friend or two and purchasing one of their boats. Amakara is very affordable compared to other a la carte places like Taki in the falls; Speaking of which is probably the only other sushi place in the area that rivals them for quality.

They make the best Spider roll in Niagara as well, hands down one of my favorite rolls. Their red tuna is dynamite, can't beat it for quality which is usually a problem at AYCE places, they use really low quality tuna or serve white tuna which isn't even tuna most of the time.

I would suggest to make a reservation as the dining area is rather tiny, only seats about 20 people at max capacity. Their parking area is abysmal but if you know the area you can park a block away and walk, there's also about 3 parking spots on a one way side street right across from the entrance... so park there.

Also do not go and eat here on a hot day, they don't have air conditioning and it gets really muggy inside, it also ruins the flavor of the sushi. This is definitely a place you want to go on a cooler day or any time during the winter. They're closed on Sundays which means Friday and Saturday nights can get a bit crazy. My suggestion is to go during the week Monday - Thursday for dinner....

I went for dinner and they gave us the worst seat which is right under the stairs. When one person was walking upstairs, we could literally feel the stairs shaking. We ordered a triple roll, salmon avo roll, spicy crispy roll, and steak don. The picture I attached is a spicy crispy roll and it’s just big avocados, I couldn’t even taste anything else than avocado. It was awful. Also, we stayed an hour and a half but the steak don still didn’t come out while another table who came later than us got their whole sushi boat. How does steak don which is just a rice bowl with steaks on top take longer than a whole sushi boat? We couldn’t wait longer for a steak don to come out so we just left starving. The server was an old lady and she was very disrespectful. She didn’t say a single apology. We have been to this restaurant so many times and now we decided that we won’t come back here. Very...

I have no comment about the food, it was great. We tried the Udon and the Eel rice with a dish of salmon avo roll.

However, we came at 8, order at 8:15 and the first dish come out at 8:40 which is the salmon avo roll. My Udon came quickly after that. However my friend has to wait for another 20 minutes for the eel rice.

The store did not crowded, only have 4 tables. The table on the right of us order first us 5 minutes. The table on the left came after us 15 minutes and order after us 10minutes. They finished their dish is the time my friend got her eel rice? How magic?

And there was 2 servers but only 1 server working after 8:45 and the other one sitting and having fun with the customers (maybe his friends). We are very mad. Even the food is great but this is the first time and last time we come. I did not take the picture of the eel rice because at that time we...