Zuuma — Restaurant in Ålesund

So, this happened TWICE:

Me and my boyfriend were at the restaurant on March 2021 and ordered a few dishes that were marked as suitable for people with shellfish allergy - which is my boyfriend’s case. By the time, the waiter said that it wasn’t possible to serve him the chosen food, because the staff didn’t have the time to wash the knives or change the oil, and the food would therefore contain shellfish residues.

We managed to order something else, after a lot of back and forward - while we overheard the staff making the food talking about us.

We sent a complaint to the owner, who was very polite at the time, and guaranteed that this wasn’t the restaurant’s standard. We received our money back and today (a year later) we decided to give the restaurant a new chance - as the owner handled the situation well and was really polite with us one year ago.

The SAME thing happened today, again. As we called to order food (for 5 people) that are marked on the menu as suitable for people wish allergies, the staff informed us over the phone that it wouldn’t be possible to make the food because they didn’t have the time to wash/change the knives.

I don’t even think it’s legal to mark a dish as “allergy friendly” in the menu and then inform a client that he/she cannot be served that, because the food would ACTUALLY contain shellfish residues. Unfortunately the experience felt so discriminatory and unprofessional (AGAIN) that you we just giving up on the restaurant. Advise you to write “Don’t serve allergic people on Saturdays” instead of making people go through an awful experience.

PS: We called another restaurant, ordered the “allergy friendly” food in their menu and they even had the care to ask if we needed anything else to be changed. When we mentioned “if you could wash the knives” they took that as an obvious thing to do - something one would also expect from a restaurant like...

Visited Zuuma two nights in a row. First night I wasn't so hungry so had snacks, and then returned Sunday for a proper dinner.

The first night they were full / booked so I sat at the sushi bar. Ordered edmame, and a couple types of nigiri. Was pretty good, however, the tuna nigiri had a massive fibrous tendon in both pieces. It was very chewy and could not be eaten. Bit of a shame. Otherwise, fast service once order was placed (it took a little for them to come for my order). Waitress was very blunt.

Second night, I made a booking being Sunday there are few places open for dinner so expected them to be full again. I arrived and was asked to wait 1 minute while the waiterperson set the table. He set the table and then continued to serve other tables. I stood awkwardly for 10 minutes until I was told the table was ready, then took another 20 minutes before they returned to take my order. I ordered edamame, sashimi, rice & scampi skewers. The skewers were SO SALTY, I could only stomach x1 of them. The edamame were salty also, so much so, it looked as though they had dropped the box of salt flakes in the bowl. Sashimi, tuna slices seemed more like tuna Ponzu (slices), NOT sashimi. I told the waiter I could not eat the skewers, nothing was done. Pretty sure I was also charged for tuna Ponzu (slices). I didn't keep the receipt so is my fault.

Overall, waitstaff were okay, but seemingly unable to cope with the demand of dinner rush. And when told some of the food was not okay, something should really be done to address it.

Sushi is okay but nothign special and attention to detail is needed to make it worth of...

What a waste of good potential.

The goods: design is neat, raw ingredients (fish, in particularly) are great, water was served upon seating which is a polite thing that I like.

The bads: cryptographic menu(!), instead of writing what each roll contains, they use some generic 1/2 words that tells you nothing. What is iceroll? What is hot maki? What is inside '4 maki combination'? You'll have to interrogate the waitress to find out! However, when asking the waitress 10 questions, you'll surely forget/mix some. Our waitress didn't even know the answers so she brought with her - and that's kind of funny - a menu with explanations to use for answering our questions. Whoopty f-ing doo.

Well, went kinda blind and ordered 3 rolls, and a sashimi even though we usually don't really like sashimi. The sashimi was, by far, the best course (hence: good ingredients). The rolls were generic, and for the price and premise of this place it just doesn't cut it.

Another small, but irritating thing, was the fact they had a WiFi network, reserved only for employees. As a tourist, this is a frustrating thing.

The meal cost us 600nkk, without drinks. We did not enjoy it as the food did not meet the expectations. Medicare sushi, at best.

I'd give it a 1 star rating, but due to the potential I'm leaving a 2. If you decide to visit stick to the sashimi / fish courses, the sushi doesn't worth it's price and...