San Sai Japanese Grill — Restaurant in Portland

7 STAR REVIEW* This is hands down the best value restaurant in Portland that I have encountered. The sushi is fairly average priced, but the combo plates are where San Sai shines. Let’s start with the combo plates. Hungry and craving some Japanese food, I called in a tempura and chicken plate for pickup. It’s $10.50. I grabbed the bag and I thought I was just handed Thor’s hammer. It weighed at least 2 lbs. A full box of tempura vegetables and shrimp, delicious dipping sauce, a full breast of teriyaki chicken and a cup of rice, and a salad of your choice. After that extremely positive experience, I felt like balling out the other day and getting a fat plate of sushi. I got the Nigiri special ($14?) and the hand roll special ($10.50?)- both specials came with a miso soup and salad of choice. Let’s count. That’s 10 nigiri, 3 fatty hand rolls, soup x2, and salad x2. Add a 22 oz Sapporo for $6 and that’s a mondo $30 plate (-gratuity). I could not move after the meal. I became Violet Beauregard, and San Sai was my Willy Wonka. Not only that, but I convinced my friend to indulge with me and he tried the tempura + chicken plate. Once that plate thundered onto the table he looked at me in disbelief. Add two more cut rolls ($7 total?) to his order and that’s a recipe to become Augustus Gloop. San Sai, again, proved themselves as the proverbial Willy Wonka of Japanese cuisine. Unreal. Can’t recommend enough to my young peeps who need value but have a taste for something other than burritos and pizzas. Also, after having a lot of raw fish from this place, I have not been sick after- except sickened with myself for polishing off such a mighty plate :’) - I don’t usually think about that but since it’s a sushi joint I might as well slip in. Fairest portions for...

We have been coming to San Sai for over 10 years and used to love the quality and prices. Every time, the cleanliness of the tables, dishes, and bathrooms got progressively worse. They could spend $200 to replace gross light fixtures and clean/paint the bathrooms. Please charge extra for your food so that you can hire someone to clean the entire place regularly. We can see the walls back in the kitchen covered with what looks like dust and grime. The light fixtures over the tables are dripping with spider webs and dust. There’s a hole in the wall of the womens bathroom that has been there for years. It’s now stuffed with toilet paper. A $5 kit from a hardware store could patch it. Today the air conditioner wasn’t working so it was 80+ degrees and our sushi looked deflated. The wasabi was hard on one side and there were flies flying all over the dining room. The table was sticky and the menus were disgusting. Please use QBR codes for your menus if you’re not going to provide clean menus. Until they invest in simple routines to clean up the place, we won’t be back. The quality has dipped so much and I think they should raise their prices to clean things up. I’d happily pay more and I’m super bummed to part ways with our favorite sushi spot. I’m giving 3 stars because they used to be SO good and I want them to succeed. I’d even volunteer to fix up the bathrooms if they paid...

We like this place for its sushi, but not last night. We didn't even get to eat any of the sushi: There was only three tables with guests but for some reason the staff couldn't handle it. After a long wait, our sever had to be reminded to bring us water..then a few minutes later...bring us menus...and then take our order. It took a really long time to get our drinks. After a half hour, and all the other tables after us getting their food already, I inquired about our order. Our server said nothing. She didn't even look at me. I asked if she still had our order. She had lost our order. No apologies. She just said she was "too busy" and "that we needed to reorder our items." Again, no apologies. The server didn't care that she had made a mistake. She didn't seem to care about being there. The rest of the staff just stared at us and didn't offer to help out. Since they didn't make a move to take our order again, we paid for our drinks and we left. Because of Sansei's bad service they lost two longtime customers. I don't understand why the service here has to be so bad. Also I've never understood why the tables here are always very sticky and the bathrooms look like they never have...