AYCE Sushi SCM — Restaurant in Santa Ana

After reading all the reviews I'm beginning to think it was just bad luck on my part, however this was a terrible meal from start to finish, at nearly $30 per person for the standard menu.

Tempura shrimp was terrible, no crunch and the shrimp itself was very overcooked.

Tempura calamari: it came out piping hot fresh, but was a ratio of 5:1 breading to squid. By the time the breading was cooked the squid was flavorless rubber. The tempura breading also had no flavor, was just oily.

Gyoza was standard, came out fresh but had no discernable flavors, bland overall.

In-n-out shrimp roll. The avocado was overly ripe having no texture, felt like mashed avocado but clearly wasnt. The amount of mayo on this made my wife's stomach turn instantly.

Baked mussels are one of my favorites, sadly it didnt seem baked at all, just sauce dumped on cold mussels, one of them also had a fair amount or shell mixed in despite that mussel's shell being fully intact.

Dynamite roll and popcorn roll. Dynamite is my go to at AYCE and often blends the best of both worlds, delicate sushi roll with baked flavorful scallops in sauce on top. These scallops were tiny and completely mushy, very clearly cheap frozen scallops. The popcorn topping was the same as the other fried items, super oily with no discerning flavor, please add atleast some salt.

Speaking of salt, the miso soup (which comes from a automatic pouring machine) was overly salty and has no light flavors to it.

We got a simple roll to start as well, a spicy tuna I believe. This was a very standard roll with nothing amazing, however it had the chewiest seaweed I've ever had, not sure if that indicates freshness or ir it was frozen, I couldn't tell as this was the first time experiencing that.

I really wanted to like this place as I live nearby, love AYCE sushi places, and the reviews were great. Sadly this place disappointed with every item I recieved. Atleast they did not charge for all the remaining food we didnt eat most since the in-n-out roll made us sick. Servers also never checked in nor offered refills on our drinks.

If this place was charging $18 I could understand the cheap ingredients, but this was a higher priced place with low...

This place is good if you're dining in, but the past two takeout experiences have been a let down. The first time they gave us no soy sauce and this time they forgot the wasabi and ginger.

It took about 20 times of calling just to get them to answer. I'm not even exaggerating. After calling for 30 mins, they finally answered and the lady who took our order was pretty rude. When asked about the almost AYCE special, all we were told was not today. There's nothing on the special that says it's only available certain days of the week and we weren't given any other reasoning as to why we couldn't order it.

They don't put the sauces on the rolls and instead put them in little cups. I'd much rather just have the sauces on the roll already since it's a lot harder to evenly on the rolls. Not only that, they gave us a container of eel sauce that had maybe a teaspoon worth for 4 rolls. I'm sure this was done purposely because they charge for extra sauces.

When I picked up my order the baked and tempura rolls were already cold and overall the flavor was lacking. Not sure if this is due to being takeout or because of a decline in quality since I was last able to dine in.

They're also allowing people to dine inside, which I'm not sure how since the stay at home order had been in effect since December. Kind of disappointing that money is more important than safety, especially seeing as Santa Ana has the highest cases out of...

We went in on a whim to try it out. We read a few mixed reviews about the food and service before hand so we were prepared for just about anything. Sushi, can be good, or really bad! We arrived and got on their waitlist! We waited about :20 minutes to get in. Once seated the owner/waiter briefed us on how they operate options, etc.. We ordered the all you can eat (AYCE) Sushi option and the AYCE Sashimi packages. We could not have been more pleased! The food was really good and the service was just fine. The Sahimi was fresh with beautiful, color, flavor, and texture. We especially like the raw oyster on the half shell. We ordered a variety of different sushi rolls, all were loaded with flavor! The Sushi orders come in a 4pc size, perfect for sharing. We ordered a large Sapporo Light beer and a bottle of hot Sake as well! These are ad on’s but at $2.99 each they were a bargain. As I said above, the service was just fine! Both servers who helped took the time to explain how their AYCE packages worked, which we appreciated. The meal was topped off with an ample size portion of green tea ice cream. You’re allowed a two hour window to graze and dine with their all you can eat package. We had more than enough food and we’re in and out in just over an hour! All in all a good experience and we will...