Sushi Fresh Ventura — Restaurant in Ventura

Firstly let me begin by saying the sushi is absolutely delicious and you will not be disappointed by that... if I could just rate the sushi it would be 5 stars . Now the reason as to why I'm giving sushi fresh a 2 star rating. Service to me will typically out weigh everything, if Service is bad then the overall experience is ruined in my opinion. I arrived at sushi fresh roughly around 2:30pm. Waitress was polite as well as the other server's and staff. It had taken 30min to get drinks.( water and ice tea's) from start to finish the service was absolutely slow??? They seemed to have enough staff for the tables that had been set up for outdoor dining.So not really sure why its like that. We didn't leave till 5:00 -5:15pm . The experience given was OK not really enough for me to go back. I will say, this is the second experience exactly like this 3 years ago with my family. Reason why I didn't go back.. thought it had changed. I WAS ABSOLUTELY WRONG. Also they charged an automatic gratuity for 4 adults???I have never experienced this in any restaurant with 4 adults.

Let me end this by saying I am not complaining just stating what happened to me on this particular day. 09/20/20

Food was fantastic Service was ok . Not good or great Expect a very very long wait . To the point that you debate to leave - you have...

Not the first time I've eaten here before but unfortunately this time was really terrible. So we walked in and were initially told it would be a 30 min wait but there was 2 open tables and one reserved(obviously cant use the reserved one) so we were waiting inside as it was cold outside and i think the owner kind of got mad at us because we were in the way so she told us to just sit at a table and essentially told us we had an hour to eat. The rest of the experience went well up until the food came. As soon as I started eating my rice i notice a tiny little black eyelash on the rice..... ok no biggie but as i kept eating i noticed a long black hair in the rice at this point I was like ok I'm done! I know its bound to happen but it really wasnt the incident that got me so frustrated it was the customer service or the lack thereof! The waitress gladly took the plate and asked if I'd like a replacement I kindly declined because I was just too grossed out. The rest of my party finished eating and we got the bill and they had the audacity to charge me for food that I hadn't even eaten 25% of!!!! Then they asked if I noticed that they voided out my lemonade like what!?!?!?!?!?! Void out the $15 meal I wasnt able to eat! Anyways i dont think i will be returning as this experience was just too...

The experience could have been better... It is expected that Friday nights are busy. With a full bar, full dining room and when unexpected orders are being boxed to go, it was obvious to see, the majority of the staff was pushing themselves not to drop the ball. There was high stress from those trying to keep up and a quiet cry for help from a few newbie servers and cooks guessing at "where is the order" and "who ordered what" (seems my food was paraded at least 30 minutes around the dining room, being pushed on other guest, then pushed back saying is not theirs). This is not the environment in which slowing down to enjoy sushi could be done, much less talk to the chef and ask recommendations, at least it was not so for me. Perhaps the experience is best on a less busy time, but being busy is a blessing that needs to be kept up with good service; for example, learning to respond efficiently and organized when busy, or cap the amount of people served during the peaks (say like, no to go orders from 7-8). Mindful restaurants do it, where they focus the service for dining room guests so they have a good experience and limit distractions from outside orders. I will try again another time when I can perceive a better pace...