Blue Sushi Sake Grill — Restaurant in Houston

I came here with my husband and a friend about two weeks ago on Saturday 7/9/22 around 7pm. There was a 45 min wait to sit inside, which by they way was well decorated, so we opted to sit outside. For drinks we ordered the cucumber jalapeno margarita and blue mule. For food we ordered seaweed salad, brussels sprouts and shishito peppers to share. My husband and I, who are vegetarians, ordered the vegan tuna tower (we hadn't been to a place that offered this so we were quite intrigued), shiitake to me roll (my favorite), cowgirl roll (tastes like a burger and was very tasty), and thai hippie roll (husband's favorite) along with the inari (tofu) and unami (bbq eggplant) nigiri. Our friend ordered a few nigiri and enjoyed them. Overall we enjoyed the food and was happy that there were plenty of vegetarian/vegan options. However, where they fell short was the subpar customer service and the fact that they brought out our VEGAN TUNA tower and it turned out to be REAL TUNA! (1st pic is the real tuna and 2nd pic is the vegan tuna) My husband hesitated so we asked the person who brought our food out if it was vegan tuna and he assured us it was. My husband still hesitating, I was like this place is known to have lots of vegan options and yadi yadi yah...so I'll go ahead and give it a try. My friend and I literally put it in our mouth and started to chew (and thought hmm....this kind of tastes like the real deal) when the guy came out again and said oh no it is not vegan tuna, it is real tuna. I spit it out so fast. I could not believe it! He took the plate away and shortly after our waiter came out to apologize. Speaking of our waiter and the subpar customer service, he didn't bring us any plates or soy sauce, we had to ask the person who brought out our appetizers, he barely refilled our waters (it was pretty hot sitting outside) or check up on us. Also, what we witnessed with the waiters and servers coming in and out was a lot of confusion - not knowing which table food belonged and asking tables did you order XYZ. I would imagine tables are numbered and food orders have table numbers on them. When the check came out I have to admit it was a little off putting to me to see that 18% was the lowest. The other was 20% and I think maybe 25%. I'll be honest, I certainly did not want to leave 18% but I did. For the service we got or lack thereof and the fact that they gave a vegetarian real tuna, it should have been 15% or less. I wanted a copy of my credit card receipt but the waiter took too long (we waited for about 7 min) and it was too hot out so we just left. Would I return? Not anytime soon. I left with a 'fishy' taste in my mouth. They definitely have some things to work on with customer service and getting their staff properly trained with the...

Sit at the bar and eat before you go. The aesthetics and drinks are great! We ended up sick, see details below.

One of my daughters used to love this place, she's been several times so we did a family happy hour lunch yesterday, on Saturday. The HH drinks are great but if you can find a couple items you like it's probably worth the trip but in general the food seems to be very bland or one ingredient seems to overtake everything.

The service wasn't great at all, she seemed over worked, she may have been picking up someone else's slack. She took the order and read it back correctly. Someone else brought our food out and several things were wrong.

We got food before our HH drinks. My son is extremely picky of sushi, he tried the Hawaiian Roll but the salmon was all you could taste. He loved the mango rangons tho.

I ordered hotel cali no jalapenos and was extremely disappointed, the cream cheese was half the roll and all I could taste. The crab mix was supposed to be spicy, could barely taste it. The sweet chili sauce as the bed of the plate was all sweet, no spicy. The tidal wave wasn't bad but it was bland. I asked for the eel sauce on the side whoever brought the food said no eel sauce but I corrected and said I asked for it on the side. I didn't like the eel sauce anyway. I ordered cherry bombs towards the end. About 15 minutes after ordering them, she cleared most of the dishes and chopsticks, including mine from the table. I said well, I guess I'm not getting the cherry bombs. At this point we were ready for the check bc we were talking about our disappointment in the food. Two of my daughters said the miso soup tasted like broth, very bland. About 15 minutes later they brought there cherry bombs, I had to use my daughters chopsticks, they hadn't taken yet. I started to say take them back and delete from the tab.

10 minutes later the check came out. For five people our check without tip was roughly $150.

There were a couple rolls my daughters like, the crunchy red wasn't bad.

We were walking around for about 45 minutes but had to leave bc my son wasn't feeling good. He had diarrhea all night and woke up at 3 am vomiting. No one else was vomiting but we all had bubble guts.

A $150 family lunch bill to end up sick and regretting the decision. My daughter who loved this place was actually organizing a get together with her friends for HH brunch and has since canceled. Seeing other reviews, seems this place was once great but something changed, seeing too many people end up...

This place is a hot mess. Granted, we came in at prime time on a Friday evening and they were slammed with some larger parties, so perhaps we would have had a different experience on another night.

We interacted with at least 3 servers who were definitely high as a kite. The girl at the front was a space cadet without even a lick of friendliness about her. Our main server was SUPER out of it. He put in an order for an app after we asked if the crab in it was real crab or imitation crab. When we said we didn’t actually order the app, we were just inquiring because of a shellfish allergy, he said he would comp the app, but it showed up on the bill anyway. To his credit, he did come and discuss the shellfish allergy 3 separate times because the kitchen were very concerned about it - they asked if cross-contamination was an issue, and they also wanted us to know that they couldn’t guarantee that the imitation crab didn’t contain any traces at all of shellfish. I appreciated that due diligence. However, the first dish that was delivered to our table was a roll with shrimp in it. It was someone else’s order, but luckily it was the kind of roll with shrimp tails sticking out of the end so we recognized it. That’s a huge faux pas.. you can’t deliver shellfish to a table that has indicated a shellfish allergy. They didn’t seem to know in general what orders belonged to which table. There was a sweet little Asian girl who was wandering around with drinks, asking each table if they ordered any of them.

It’s a shame because this place clearly has potential and I’m guessing it’s popular because of the vibe. The drinks were good, but our sushi fell short (some really weird taste combos), and the service was just so bad that, for the money they charge, I don’t know if I’d give them a second chance which sucks because they’re like a 10-minute walk from our house and I always want to support...