Tsurukame Sushi — Restaurant in Fukuoka

TL;DR Literally the WORST sushi I’ve had in my entire life. I’ve had plenty of sushi in Japan, Singapore, and all around the world, and even the sushi served in Spain’s chinatown tasted better than this. On top of that, the staff displayed such terrible attitude that it bordered on embarrassing; even pre-school kids have better manners.

Full version:

It’s been slightly more than a year since I last visited this establishment, and boy oh boy has it stayed in my head—for all the worst reasons possible. Legend has it I’m still trying to chew their questionable sea bream to this day.

Being tourists who were tired and hungry, obviously the first thing we’d do is look on Google for sushi shops near us. Noticed this restaurant had 5 stars with many reviews (or at least it did back in Nov 2023), we decided to give it a try. Walked in and said hello in English, didn’t receive a very warm welcome, but we were seated nonetheless.

We ordered the premium set. Most of the sushi wasn’t well made, and the star of the dish—the fish—were mostly average to below average. In particular, the sea bream, was just appalling. I took one bite into mine, and so began the chewing that will ensue for the next 10 years of my life.

We looked around, and noticed that the staff and the chef were looking at us and sniggering. Not discreetly at all, might I add. By this point, it was clear that the staff thought we were tourists and decided to offer us the worst pieces of fish available in the world.

So, we signalled for one of them to come over, and told her IN JAPANESE that the fish was too tough. Well, that slapped the smirk right off her face, and subsequently the rest of the staff. What happened next was just bizarre. She insisted that the fish was fine and that it was OUR PROBLEM. Like what did that even mean??? We had stronger and more teeth than her. Anyways, she then hopped into the kitchen, came back and passed us A PAIR OF SCISSORS. Jfc, just looking back that was hilarious hahahaha. How thick-skinned must you be to bring out a pair of scissors to your customers instead of offering to change it?

She didn’t even try to cut it for us, no. We had to do that ourselves. Lo and behold, even the scissors couldn’t cut through that leathery piece of fish.

I can feel the second hand embarrassment for them as I’m writing this review. My friends were polite enough, so they finished up the rest of the sushi. Me? I refused to even drink my...

Halfway through the meal saw some bad reviews about this place on Google maps, and I have to say... I think it's possible for places to get better! Went in here after seeing that it had been around a long time, and had the tuna sashimi platter from the English menu, the fatty tuna roll and the abalani, all was fabulous but the sashimi platter stole the show, genuinely never had anything better in all my time in Japan. At the end there was an American chef who came up to me and asked if I speak English (my Japanese is limited to two words) and checked that everything was okay with the meal, the other staff were kind and attentive. Literally my only gripe was I feel like the Japanese menu was possibly bigger, but couldn't really tell, otherwise having the English menu was very helpful and so was contactless pay, And finally to the restaurant, thank you so much...

This place hates foreigners.

I wish I had read the reviews more thoroughly. Wanted really good sushi. Sushi for us was average despite dropping $200. Im sure we got tourist cuts.

I am a Japanese American and try my best to speak Japanese when traveling. Funny part about that is that I got both menus.

Took half an hour to give us a menu. Gave us one for the four of us. Asked for two menus so my wife and I could have separate menus to look over to order for our two kids. They scoffed and said no. Asked if we wanted an English menu. Said yes.

Proof they hate us is that I can read some Japanese and with the American menu, the prices are 15% higher.

I took a pic with the English menu on the left and Japanese menu on the right.

10% higher for the food and 5% service charge....