YO! Westfield Stratford — Restaurant in London

Had a very poor experience earlier this month when we went there to help a friend celebrate a birthday after we haven't gone to Yo Sushi for a few years.

The start wasn't particularly smooth as we waited at the payment counter area for a while with no one paying us any attention. We weren't sure whether we could just pick a table to sit or whether, since the whole pandemic thing, we needed to wait to be seated.

We went off to the takeaway counter and was redirected back to the payment counter area. Only, this time, another group was seated before us because we essentially left our spot. Fortunately, there was another empty table available so we didn't have to wait long to be seated - not a particularly bad start but wasn't a smooth one.

The new system was such a marked departure over the previous one that we were confused for a while. A staff member tried to help by explaining the new conveyor belt system (wasn't her fault that we've experienced far more advanced systems that this so the explanation wasn't really needed).

Turns out you need to create a Yo Sushi account to make an order - a bit convoluted, but not particularly bad. Still another negative aspect to our experience as it introduced another step to our dining experience that didn't feel particularly necessary as other places with QR code-based menus don't often require you to have or create an online account to make an order.

The new conveyor belt system also greatly annoyed us as there's not much time to get the order on the table before it set off on it's merry way, leaving us floundering not knowing how or whether the food will return to us in Yo Sushi's system. Fortunately, a member of staff saw our situation and stepped in to personally hand our order to us.

The menu is greatly paired down from it's previous offerings, to such an extent that we spent a bit more time trying to figure out what we could order instead of the other sushi dishes that we had in mind. I advise looking through the menu long before arriving at Yo Sushi.

The California Temaki was a particular disappointment as they were quite messily done (as pictured). The rice and crabsticks were spilling out - you could've gotten far neater efforts in places like Waitrose or those that offer sushi boxes. It also lacked cucumber slices and fish roe so the roll ends up feeling rather expensive at £4.50 each for just rice, nori, some crabsticks, and a piece of avocado.

My friend also ordered hot green tea, which was refillable but wasn't offered any refills throughout our meal. We could certainly have asked for a refill but would have been a better customer experience to be offered. Previously, I recall there was a dispenser already at the table so you never really needed to ask.

Our order ended up being rather pricey at a bit over £60 for the three of us and we were still hungry after that unsatisfying experience. Sushi isn't a particularly cheap type of food but to end up still being unsatisfied after lunch was disappointing. My friend and I even went elsewhere on a different day to 'eat away' the disappointing Yo Sushi experience.

I had a chicken curry ramen with was noodles with a spicy, soupy broth. I had expected a thicker broth since it was supposed to be chicken curry but I suppose it's just a Westernised version and Yo Sushi's definition of curry ramen. I suspect the soup is actually the spicy seafood ramen soup mixed in with a bit of chicken katsu curry and served with chicken katsu cutlets so that it can be called chicken curry ramen.

Ultimately, we know that Yo Sushi offers it's own more Westernised take on Japanese food but, the dining experience is objectively and subjectively poorer than that from a couple years ago. I wouldn't recommend dining here unless you haven't been exposed to other options.

If you're looking for a quick sushi experience, you're probably better off paying a visit to Waitrose (or for more authentic fare, Japan Centre).

Update 1 DEC 21: Still no response from Yo Sushi after getting in touch as advised. Please don't bother...

A little about me; I am a manager in a coffee company.

It was a Sunday at about 1 pm my partner and I went to the sushi place to get some sushi before going to the cinema to watch the matrix. Shortly after eating the sushi, I began to feel quite unwell. I have horrible pains. I missed the whole movie as I was in the bathroom for about 2.5hrs. (This was the first thing I ate that day)

After the movie finished and I came out of the bathroom I asked my partner to go to the sushi place and ask for a refund. I went back into the toilet. My partner tried to get the refund but the Manager basically accused us of lying claiming "I don't know if you really bought this here, for all I know you may be lying", I heard this as my partner was on call with me. (As we didn't have the receipt but we bought it by card so we had that proof).

Once I heard about this I went to Yo Sushi to talk to the manager. He claimed that is had already closed the till. Which is Understandable. Although personally, knowing myself I would have given the refund.

Anyway, I thought to myself, okay no worries, I get it. I'll do it online.

So he carried on talking about how he can't do it so on and so forth. I waited patiently until he finishes talking. He finished talking. And I said to him 'you know, I understand that you can't give me the refund. I am not even angry about that. But not one time during this entire conversation did you apologise for my horrible experience at your restaurant." I did not get one apology. He claimed that he apologised to my partner which wasn't true. But also, I had a horrible experience, why didn't he apologise to me?

When I came there at first I tried to explain to him what had happened he immediately began to interrupt me and speak over me. It was a horrible experience.

And after I said all of this he still didn't apologise! Not one time did I get an apology!

Eventually, my partner got frustrated that he kept on shouting at me and speaking over me so he said loudly and assertively ' Mate, you need to stop raising your tone.' He began to get angrier, shouting over us. One of the staff called security for some reason?

I am not even angry about the sushi situation. People make mistakes it is fine. I am a manager myself and I understand that mistakes happen. I just wanted a refund and an apology. The managers horrible reaction was the worse part of the whole experience.

I have been working in hospitality for about seven years. And I understand that sometimes customers can be rude and too much. But if one of my staff members acted this way there definitely would have been something done about it.

If he would have been apologetic and explained the situation well, I would have gone online to get the refund and I would have come back one day to Yo Sushi. But after this experience, I will never be back. No matter which yo...

Unfortunately the service was really appalling from the moment we got to the restaurant. The server at the dest was very unwelcoming and didn’t even say hello to us. I ordered a coke and the drink holder arrived at the table and the light went green but was empty. I let the server know and she brought me my receipt over and told me that my drink order was ‘pending’ and that I would either have to wait or order a new drink. I kept trying to explain to her that the drink had clearly just not been placed in the drink holder but she just kept telling me that it was a technical error and there was nothing she could do. When I asked how long I would have to wait she said she didn’t know. When I asked if I could speak to a manager, I was told there weren’t any available. When I asked for a refund for my drink, she said she would get it refunded, I then watched her walk over and get a coke and put it in a new drink holder which then arrived at my table. The entire time the server was very unapologetic that my drink hasn’t arrived, and was implying that it was my fault the order hadn’t arrived. My sister has also ordered gyozas, which hasn’t arrived after half an hour. When we spoke to a different member of staff and asked about how long the wait for them would be she spoke to the kitchen but didn’t let us know how long the wait would be. The gyozas were then sent to the wrong table and we had to wait a further 10 minutes before they checked if we had got them. The only positive was that the sushi was very good, however, it did not make up for the way I was spoken to by...