Wagaya Sushi & Grill — Restaurant in Vancouver

I've come here once before and had a great time. However, my partner and I came for valentine's day and were very disappointed with the experience. Now I understand that it's a busy holiday, so I try to cut a little slack here. There were only 2 employees on the floor, but they were taking orders, reservations, call-in orders, and Doordash all at once. Staffing definitely needs some work. Because of this, service was lackluster. Our water glasses were never refilled; my cup also had some leftover piece of food stuck to the bottom of it.

Sushi was good at the very least. They did forget a handroll I had ordered, but I wasn't too bothered. I let one of the servers know, who said she would get it for me. She came back maybe 15-20 minutes later saying that they were too busy and couldn't make it for me, so the item would be voided. I was little surprised by the response (can't say I've heard that before), but again, I understand that they were really busy.

When it came to checkout, the other server met us at the register. She gave us the receipt, which still had the handroll. We explained that it was supposed to be voided as the previous worker had told us. This server insisted that it had been removed, but the receipt still said, "1 Salmon." It was rather uncomfortable to argue with her when we just wanted to keep things fair. Eventually she removed the item and took my partner's cash. She dropped some of the change and walked away.

I want to emphasize that I do enjoy the food, and pricing is pretty good. However this place does not work well under pressure. I try to be lenient with this kind of thing due to the influx of customers on valentine's day. I hope they get more waiting staff in the future and that the next time I come...

This used to be my preferred sushi restaurant, however after two issues with food safety- we will be finding a new place to go. A week ago my husband and I watched the server take our plate of sushi to the table across from us. We saw the entire interaction and that the food was never touched. We weren’t excited about the food going to the wrong table but knowing it wasn’t touched gave us piece of mind. We accepted the sushi and went along with our meal. Tonight, one week later, we experience the same server once again take our food to the wrong table. He put the sushi down and walked away. This table was several booths over and not within our site. After a few minutes the customer’s informed him that was not their order. So he picked up the plate of sushi and brought it to our table. We told him no, that he had left the food with other customers and that we would like it remade. The server left and then came back with the plate of sushi. He stated that they could not remake the sushi, saying “they didn’t touch it”. My husband said to the man that we don’t know that they did not touch the food and that we couldn’t see that nor could he. The sever scoffed and said, “wow”. I politely informed him that was was not the appropriate response and that serving food that had already been given to other customers was a food safety violation. After the sever left and came back they offered to remake it. At this point we weren’t trusting that the food would actually be remade or that the experience would be any different- given that this was already our second day with this server.

We will not be returning due to the concern of food...

7/3/22 Edit: Their prices have increased a few separate times since they've opened, so I unfortunately had to remove them from my regular rotation. They're still good for sure but the value proposition is gone. My original