MakiMaki Sushi - Central Park South — Restaurant in New York

Fast casual place where you order at the counter for takeout. They do have three or four small tables and bar seats available But for the most part it’s definitely meant for takeout. It’s nice that they do their handrolls in a way where the nori stays fresh. They also have quite a few summer offerings including a chirashi. You can order cut or hand roll combos in both the regular category and the premium category. The meal also comes with either miso soup and edamame or a side of spicy seafood soup which mostly seems like a way for them to get rid of extra cuts of fish but I didn’t mind because the soup was served piping hot, the fish wasn’t overcooked, and flavor wise it was pretty good with a nice low burning heat at the end.

Unfortunately the actual sushi itself was a bit disappointing. The spicy scallop roll looked like it was injected with mush and not much of it. The handles were better with the Ikura one being quite solid with a pleasant salty pop. The grilled Toro salmon didn’t taste particularly fatty. It takes like a decent cut of salmon but it was muddled by the mayo on top. The blue fin Toro was also very disappointing. It had almost no flavor and had been trapped into an almost paste like consistency. The rice was alright for a fast casual place tho not particularly flavorful. Overall the meal was a little disappointing. I appreciate the fast casual nature of the meal but I was hoping for something slightly more premium when I ordered from the premium category. All in all the price wasn’t that much cheaper than if I were to go to...

Pretty disappointing. We ordered for takeout one Friday night. Everything was on time, packaged nicely, but there was way too much rice for the amount of fish there was. It reminded me of supermarket sushi. I guess I was just expecting a bit more quality for the price that we paid. Here is everything we ordered:

Grilled Salmon Toro cut up roll (belly strip of a salmon fillet, grilled with sea salt, served with crispy lettuce and QP mayo) - tasted more like leftover salmon they had to cook from the previous day before it went bad, than it did salmon toro

Bluefin Toro cut up roll (cut of fatty bluefin tuna, shiso leaf and cucumber) - also basic. Did not taste like fatty tuna to me

Hamachi Wasabi cut up roll (yellowtail fish, real salted wasabi, avocado and scallion) - I think this was not bad since I wasn't expecting a high quality fish like I was with the other two rolls but just like everything else, it was too much rice

We also ordered a few handrolls - the spicy scallop, blue crab, bluefin toro, and one more, which I honestly cannot remember for the life of me. None of them were memorable and they all kind of tasted the same, even though they were all very different proteins.

If you're craving good sushi, then this place is...

MakiMaki is a hop skip and jump from my office. When it first opened, I wasn't particularly interested as it looked like it may be a gimmicky American sushi place. My boyfriend pushed me to try it with him for lunch one day, and ever since I have been hooked. I got my entire office (all of whom are Japanese) hooked as well. As it turns out, I believe MakiMaki is owned by a father and son (?) who are Japanese. The fish is fresh and everything just generally delicious.

ONE THING that breaks my heart is they have one of the best matcha lattes in the city WHEN made correctly. When they first opened, the employee that made it for me (and I went often) made it perfectly - not too sweet, strong but not overwhelming matcha flavor. You can tell that a Japanese person made the base that they are using to make it. Lately, though, every time I order it I'm nervous because it has become a 'depends on the person making it' kind of thing. Given how much I can tell the owners care about quality and service, I'm hoping they may take the time to retrain the staff to make sure the lattes are what they used to be. Since the quality has become inconsistent my office-mates and I are left pondering alternatives for our lattes, which we don't...