Aoyama sushi Umi — Restaurant in Tokyo

Amazing dinner with the most energetic crew I have ever met. Shouting at the TOP of their lungs to welcome and to bid their customers farewell, it makes you feel so Energized to be sitting at the table which was reserved for you. Nakamura san explains each dish the best he can and makes each one with such passion. He is always looking around at the expressions of each customer to see if they are enjoying the meal and to thank you and ask how it was when you make eye contact with him. He has a warm bubbly personality and he is Super friendly as well. Food breakdown Clam soup with water shield Nice and sweet broth with delicious jelly like crunch from the water shield. Chutoro Nice and fatty with just the right amount of Chew. Great for whetting your appetite for what’s to come. Grouper sashimi Delicious chewy texture with nice fatty ness. Paired with ponzu(citrus soy), spring onions and radish, it cuts through the fish very well giving it a nice mouthfeel. Steamed abalone Delicious chewy abalone that’s so juicy it bursts with every bite, releasing its sweet umami flavours each time you Chew. Great with a dab of salt. Aji - Horsemackeral My favourite Aji of all the restaurants. So fatty it almost has a crunch on the first bite, then it melts and spreads on your tongue, followed by the delicious sweetness of the meat and the kick of the spring onions to give it some relief from the richness. (MY FAVOURITE) Grilled fish I wish I knew the name! It was delicious with a crunchy skin and soft flesh. Perfectly salted, it made for a great snack. Monkfish liver with egg custard Velvety Ankimo on TOP of a smooth warm egg custard, it goes so well together. The sweetness of the liver and the saltiness of the egg come together in a great harmony. Crab Velvety and almost custard like. The crab was very sweet and delicious and it paired so well with the Shari to give you a perfect bite. Akauni with kobujime amaebi Sweet plump sea urchin plopped on TOP of Kombu marinated amaebi Sardine rolls Iwashi cucumber and sweet marinated Kombu come together in this beautiful roll. The fattiness pairs well with the refreshing crunch of the cucumber and sweetness of the seaweed inside. Mantis shrimp - Shako First time I had mantis shrimp that tasted juicy and sweet with great flavour. Amazing! Grilled river eel - Unagi Super crispy exterior with melt in your mouth fatty meat and a delicious Kobayaki sauce. Bonito - Katsuo This was not fantastic for me. It was nice but not amazing. Squid - IKA Delicious with an almost creamy sweetness. So delicious. With a squeeze of yuzu and some salt, amazing! Sillago - Kisu A fish we learned yesterday in class but tastes so much better. Nice and mild sweetness with a very clean finish. Yellow tail - Shima Aji Deliciously fatty with an amazing sweetness in the mouth. Marinated red part of tuna - Akami zuke Nice umami flavour from the zuke and very smooth. Not amazing though Fattiest tuna - Otoro Melt in your mouth the moment you bite into it. Delicious fat just coats our tongue, pairing so well with the Shari. Gizzard Shad - Kohada Delicious fatty flavour with nice hint of vinegar from the vinegar cure. Bafun Uni from Hokkaido So sweet and delicious, with the crisp seaweed and Shari, match made in heaven. Surf Clam - Hokkigai Sweet and juicy with a great bite. So much yummier than what I made before. Miso soup It was a clear miso soup which was so light and refreshing with flavour of the sea. There must have been some clam juice added to it! Nicest miso soup I ever had. Sea eel - Anago This is a tough one. Anago is usually soft from the simmering and chock full of flavour, and I always hoped you could add some crispyness and char to it, and They actually did it here at Umi. So crispy with a slight char, nice and fatty meat coupled with a delicious eel sauce. Tamagoyaki Custard like without being too sweet with great flavour...

Food 3/5 - reasonable to try once, but would not revisit The cost was ~¥50,000 per person for the omakase and a drink which includes tax and service charge (which is not included in the Tabelog reservation menu cost).

I would describe the menu as "simple". Each dish was high quality and tasty, but I felt lacked inspiration or flair. Over the 17 seafood dishes/nigiri, none were particularly memorable or amazing for me. Although each piece of seafood was prepared or cooked to perfection (eg ika was prepared to have almost mochi like texture!), I couldn't help but feel a bit bored and disappointed with each coming dish. It may have been the chef's way of letting the ingredients speak for themselves rather than over embellishing them... However at this price point you would expect any chef to be able to achieve this. We paid more than ¥2500 per nigiri, which I think was overpriced. I honestly wonder how the locals would rate the menu served to us given it somehow has such a high Tabelog rating, is there a different menu served to locals? Or perhaps the menu caters to a traditional style of palate and it wasn't a good match for me.

Echoing other reviews here, if you have had great sushi before and want something new or different, do not come here. However if this is your first time trying expensive sushi before, you will have a good time. Nonethless I can't shake the feeling that we got the gaijin treatment and this is a bit of a tourist trap.

Service was attentive and friendly. Our dishes were all explained briefly in English by the Head chef. Note that our seating was all tourists - no locals. The dishes were also served quite quickly, we finished within 1.5hrs and felt rushed to leave.

The restaurant is small - considered "cozy" or cramped depending on how you like it, but overall clean and nothing to give particular praise or complain about.

We were all given pairs of chopsticks to take home as a souvenir (which seems like a strange gift if you were a local).

Bring cash because apparently their EFTPOS machine breaks not infrequently. The restaurant was suspiciously easy to reserve on Tabelog with a high number of openings, so take this as a precaution before you open your wallet.

Visited May '25 - Tabelog Bronze & Hyakumeiten 2025...

I had booked a reservation for 9 people at 8 PM. However, at 7:30 PM, the owner called to inform me that their credit card system wasn’t working, and we needed to bring cash—around 60,000 yen per person, which was quite a hassle to arrange at the last minute.

When we arrived, the atmosphere was cold and unwelcoming, completely opposite to the Japanese “omotenashi” culture they supposedly promoted. The staff seemed distant, and the head chef, in particular, did not make us feel comfortable at all. The sushi was served so quickly that we couldn’t keep up, and when we politely asked the chef to slow down, his attitude visibly changed for the worse.

Some of the rice portions were quite large, so we asked if they could make smaller pieces for our female guests. Despite our request, the rice portions remained too big, and when we couldn’t finish, the chef angrily threw the leftover rice into the trash. It was shocking and humiliating, especially in front of my guests.

We even bought an expensive bottle of sake, hoping to lighten the mood and offered the chef a drink as a gesture of goodwill, but he refused, which was fine, but the overall tension in the air didn’t ease up.

The sushi itself was mediocre and not worth the hefty price of 49,820 yen per person. It was rushed, and the experience felt cold and transactional. Towards the end, the chef served us the last dish with clear signals that we had to leave by 10 PM, and when we paid, the credit card machine, which supposedly wasn’t working earlier, was miraculously functional. After processing the payment, the chef stood outside, practically ushering us to leave as he was strict about closing time.

In the end, we paid 500,000 yen for 9 people, which included a 50,000 yen bottle of sake, a glass of wine, soda waters, and an oolong tea. For such a hefty price, the experience was incredibly disappointing. The rushed service, unfriendly atmosphere, and subpar sushi left us feeling that the whole evening wasn’t worth the...