Kaikaki Japanese Cuisine — Restaurant in Toronto

They were open Christmas Eve! Came with my family. Kaikaki is kinda hidden in the corner of the plaza at Bayview and Cummer, but I'm glad we found it and gave it a try. We ordered their small sashimi boat, black diamond roll, grilled salmon head, tempura dinner, and haedubap.

Each person is given miso soup, salad, and a small cup of soup noodles with a ton of tempura crisps. The salad was fresh. The miso soup was average. The soup noodles were more tempura bits than noodles, but still, free food is good food.

At $35 for 30 pieces, Kaikaki's small sashimi boat had a pretty good variety of sashimi. All of it was fresh, but not the best I've ever had. I think they had nine pieces of salmon, a couple pieces of octopus, a few of red tuna, a number of pieces of various white fish, a couple pieces of mackerel, a few pieces of what I believe was seared bonito, a few pieces of butterfish, a surf clam or two, and two small amaebi (sweet shrimp). It was presented rather prettily. I would order this again.

I ordered their black diamond for kicks. This is not Aka-Oni's black diamond. It just has the same name. At $14.99, it's a soft shell crab roll with the rice on the inside of the seaweed, and I forget what else was in the roll. It was alright, but not particularly memorable.

The grilled salmon head and the tempura dinner are found under the menu category "grill and fries". It's mildly confusing. I thought they were serving all of their grilled food with fries. Then I found out they came with soup and salad. THEY DO NOT COME WITH RICE, which I found rather odd. I know of very few Japanese and Korean entrees that do not come with either rice or noodles in some form. This being said, I think that under most Japanese menus, the grilled salmon head, at $8.99 for 3 pieces, would fall under the appetizer section, except that it came with soup and salad. Still confused. Regardless, the salmon head was hot and fresh and tender and I would love to come and just order this and their tempura. At $8.99, low carb and a good amount of fish, I think we'll be ordering this more. For those of you who haven't had salmon head before, be careful, there are a lot of bones.

Kaikaki has some of the best tempura I've had in a long time. The batter is super light and crispy. At $16.99 for 5 pieces of shrimp and 14 pieces of vegetable tempura, it's not the cheapest tempura dinner, especially without rice, but it's still worth it.

We ordered the haedubap because none of our dinners came with rice. This was more to fill us up than anything. Haedubap is kinda like a bibimbap, but with cubes of assorted sashimi instead of ground beef, no egg, and not served in a sizzling pot. This one was served like a sashimi salad, with all the rice on the side. Their spicy sauce is also served on the side, and it's delicious! Spicy, slightly sweet, and loaded with sesame oil. I ended up dipping all the whitefish from the sashimi boat into this sauce.

Service was courteous and because it was Christmas, they gave us two wrapped wooden ramen spoons as a present! Very nice of them.

I'll be back for sure. Hopefully soon.

Quirky fact: For Totoro fans, they've got Totoro curtains on like half of their...

July/2033 Went for a late dinner tonight with my daughter, her favourite is sushi. Ordered the small sushi, maki and sashimi boat plus their special “Monster Roll” - one of the main ingredient is soft shell crab. Sashimi was great so fresh and fabulous thickness, just love it. Everything was so fresh and tasty sushi and the maki( not dressed with too much sauce so you can taste the flavours of the ingredients. Service this evening was not up to par for some reason. Had to look for the server a long time to get some water. No hot tea, I hope they get their tea kettle sorted out soon! Still would recommend you try them.

Apr/2023 We have been to Kaikaki for over 5 years. What impressed me initially was their special rolls - lots of ingredients, thin on the rice and delicious! We’ve had dinner in the restaurant and taken out, both up to par. The different boats are very tasty, tempura is nice and light. Special maki rolls excellent. Service while eating in their dining room was attentive. For takeaway we usually do the sushi, sashimi and maki platters. Very satisfying and fresh. If I had to give one suggestion it would be to prepare the maki rolls like before- more ingredients...

I would say that this spot is literally a hidden gem as the store is behind a wall, so the only way would be to park and actually look. I love how cute the interior is, and with the wooden booths to make your experience much more private and intimate.

Their menu has a variety of sushi and sashimi dishes, and they have lunch specials that runs from 11:30a-3pm. The menu prices are reasonable so nothing is too overpriced. One thing I like is how their sushi and maki boats offer an option to make it all salmon (for an additional price) which is perfect if you’re a salmon lover. We went with the small “Sushi, Sashimi & Maki” boat and loved how beautiful they plated everything. The boat also came with their Miso soup, salad and crunchy noodles.

Everything was nice and fresh, and overall, we had an enjoyable time here. Definitely worth checking...