Sushi Haya — Restaurant in Tomball

My friend I went here on Saturday morning around 1230. As we had to travel a long way to try their all you can eat ($30); we were apprehensive about the quality. Suffice to say we were pleasantly surprised.

Decor is very pleasing, a modern take of a traditional Japanese interior. The menu has a smaller scope than most all you can eat places, but I think that is a plus because trying to remember make various types of rolls can get to be a chore. In the end they are pretty much the same.

Service was excellent from the wait staff and the kitchen. We typically got our servings within 5-10 minutes, which was great considering the place was three fourths of capacity.

Now on to the food. I will first explain the minor issues that I have with the place. The miso soup was to watery, they do need to add more paste. Otherwise the toppings such as the tofu and green onions were good.

Another issue is the rice. While it does have form and separating grains, it is NOT seasoned at all. All I tasted was plain rice from what I can tell, if they would season the rice or increase the seasoning if they did, I would be ecstatic.

Everything else though was a delight and in some cases was exemplary compared to to other sushi AYCE in this town. Sushi rolls were packed tightly, and did not skimp on the amount of fish on the rolls. The surf and turf roll was outstanding, the beef on it was chargrilled lightly and in addition very moist. That is a must have.

Sashimi slices were sized generously and were fresh. Salmon had a good amount of fat to them. Tuna was of the lean variety, still good. Crab sticks were great, better than the usual ones you get at a typical restaurant, even the higher end ones I have been to. I suspect it had a higher amount of Pollack than the cheaper threadfin. The texture was more finer.

What I saw on the menu that intrigued me was the striped bass on the menu. Once I had it I immediately loved it. The flesh was slick and firm with a light flavour. It had a pleasant chew. The arrangement of the slices into a rose flower was very appealing. My friend and I went for repeated servings.

A few other notes:

Coconut shrimp had a lot of cocnut shreds in the batter.

Beef robata was very good, mostly likely baked till fully cooked and lightly chargrilled.

I appreciate the smaller menu. I wish more buffets would do this, not just Sushi. That is concentrate on not too many items, and focus on improving execution in increasing repetition on less items. Besides, especially the rolls, it's presenting the same food in different combinations.

Great place to have sushi and great concept to run a restaurant. I look forward to visiting this place again.

Update: it seems the the issues. So had with the rice seasoning and the miso soup were fixed. I'm very pleased with that and cam say with confidence this is one of the best all you cam eat sushi places I...

I really want to love this place but last night will be our last time there. We have been here many times and frequent diners there. We started with them from the CHI location in the Woodlands then sometimes we went to one on 249 and one in Cypress. This one in Spring closest to home really disappointed me last night. I was with my family including 4 adults and one son 2 years old and another son 3 years old. They barely even ate anything, they have their milk bottles and slept throughout the time we were there less than 1 hr. The waitress never explained to us that they would charge $20.99/ child, otherwise you have kids menu here ( again never explained to us). We were so shocked to see the bill with $20.99/ child, what could a 2 and 3 years old gonna eat that much worth of food. I would understand if my kids are older like 9 or 10. When we questioned the bills, the sweet waitress said she will gladly take it out because the kids did not eat at all then she came back and said it was denied by the manager. We were really upset and just went ahead paid for something that the kids not even ate for $20.99 each. When leaving there, I came and spoke to the manager and said to him, to my opinion I do not think it is right to charge little kid for $20.99/ each when they were not even interested in eating these kinds of food and he answered “ Over here we do not give free food”. Sir, we did not ask for free food, that is a very rude statement and horrible customer service. As a manager, that is very unacceptable. Then he went on talking about kids menu ( noone explained that kids menu to us, because we never got charged at other locations). When I said noone explained to us that they would charge my children $20.99 each and offered kids meals which my children already full and would not eat, they’re just there accompanied with us. Then he be like ok next time you know, excuse me! There will never be a next time here. We are sadly to say goodbye because it is so closed to home and we normally 90% eating out and we never experienced this kind of rude and unprofessional treatment from management. “ We do not give free food” like we’re homeless. That’s very arrogant! I have read other reviews, they seem to have problems with kids, this place seems like they’re not kids friendly at all. Good luck with that behaviors because it will get caught up one day hurting...

EDITED 4/12/22 First trip we were excited to see another place near us in Spring. So we tried it. One review was that it was a copy of Chi. They were right, the menu is a exact copy. Well unfortunately, so is the slow service. Servers standing around on phones, not paying attention to tables. When its like 3pm on a weekend and there's 4 tables seated, its hard to not judge some. But as usual, we said we would come back since they had just opened a week before.

Second trip sealed the deal for us. We brought a couple with us so they could try it also. Started out well. We ordered food and it came faster than last time, but we gave it a pass since the place was more busy. But then the drinks started to go empty after the first refill and they werent being filled again. Had to ask to get more water. There were 2 rounds of food ordered. First was just appetizers. The second was all of our AYCE entrees. We go multiple times a week to order AYCE sushi places, so we know how much to order. I understand the "waste fee" that's on the menu. Its there for people to ensure not to abuse it. But to be charged $15 for this amount leftover after 5 people have eaten it all ordered (roughly 8 rolls with sashimi and a hand roll), is absolutely ridiculous. Also, to have a employee sit behind our table at the bar and watch us was rude and uncalled for, he was blatantly obvious about what he was sent to do. We were in no way loud, causing an issue, or even confrontational. Our server literally came over, stopped at our table to look at our plates MULTIPLE times, once time even standing next to me to stop and bend over to squint and count what was left before charging us. Maybe if we could have gotten the same effort of drinks as effort of spying and nitpicking, then youd have a better service. I’m ok with the continued drive to Sushi Masa, Ohayo, Taiazi or Mikoto. At this rate, Chi seems reasonable again. ———

TLDR: copycat of menu and service of Chi, food was good, ridiculous waste rule, enjoy being watched!

Sushi itself was good. It's the exact copy of Chi's (Woodlands) menu, unfortunately it's also a copy of Chi's irritatingly slow service. Drinks stay empty as workers walk by and food takes forever to come out. 2 hour limit, but takes an hour to get 2 orders to your table. Hope it's...