Umami Sushi & Grill — Restaurant in Matthews

This used to be our go-to sushi place in Charlotte. The food is good, but there's lots of good sushi places around town. What really set them apart was their "All You Can Eat" (AYCE) menu option. Not only was it great because there was a lot of rolls and even appetizers to choose from, but for $20 per person, it was a great deal, especially if you usually order speciality rolls.

We finally were able to return for the first time post-covid-shutdown, and were disappointed to find out the restaurant has changed owners and no longer do they offer an AYCE option. Our server recommended the sushi boat instead, but most of it was "chef's choice" which is basically a surprise mystery meal. Instead we ordered a bento box (which also had "chef's choice" sushi/sashimi) and then 2 specialty rolls, which all came out to $20+ per person anyway. Everything was good, but I don't think they really have anything to set them apart from other sushi competition in town anymore. Now they're "just another sushi place."

Five stars for food and service, but minus one star for taking away the AYCE menu and on top of that also taking away the option for people to choose their own rolls on boxes and boats, and adding an up-charge for requesting specific rolls instead.

Hopefully they'll bring back the AYCE menu option, but until then, I think we'll just stick with any of the other good sushi places that...

I hardly give bad reviews but this has to be the worst place I’ve ever been. We walk in and ask for a table for two then we order our food and everything’s alright. Our waitress brings out my wrong dish. I realised after she left and we wait and wait for her to come back but she never does. After about 15 minutes of waiting I politely ask the host to get our waitress because we’ve received the wrong dish. Our waitress comes to our table and starts raising her voice saying that my dish is what I ordered. I ordered “the pink lady”-sushi, with spicy tuna IN the sushi. The dish that I had nothing but raw shrimp and avocado in it🫥. Moving on.. she rushes to us and demanded that that’s the dish I ordered. I didn’t want to argue in front of people so I just excepted it. The host comes to our table 2 minutes later and says that that not the pink lady sushi. After all of that I didn’t even enjoy the meal. We received the RIGHT sushi this time but we didn’t even get any utensils or chopsticks and the waitress was nowhere to be found for that and when we were finally done eating and wanted our check. My boyfriend goes to the host to ask for the check and he sees she’s on her phone🫥. Honestly probably the worst service and food is definitely mediocre. Wouldn’t recommend the...

Literally the worst sushi I've ever had. We ordered the Matthews roll and the volcano roll. Absolutely disgusting, but oh, let me count the ways:

1. Their crab is actually Surimi, or as it is most commonly called - imitation crab
2. Imitation crab is actually fish, and the fish we were served had turned. It smelled fishy and tasted awful
3. The volcano roll was covered in processed cheese product, the oil was actually pooling under it 🤢🤮
4. We ate one piece of 2 of the 3 things we ordered, the 3rd roll was untouched.
5. When we informed the restaurant of these issues with this disgusting meal, we were offered 10% off! Wow, geez, thanks - more than 90% of our meal was untouched but hey, we paid for it anyway

I rarely rate a restaurant poorly, everyone has a bad dish every once in a while. Umami worked hard to get this negative review, so I'm giving it to them. The ingredients are subpar, mislabeled, and mishandled. I'm not surprised, they charge full price for them anyway and must be in a tough financial situation. After attempting to eat here, I...