Sakanaya Izakaya — Restaurant in West Lafayette

TL;DR: Don't go here unless they seriously improve their food.

Alright, this is going to be a pretty harsh review, and I know that this place has literally not even opened, but it was really disappointing compared to some of the other Japanese restaurants around (such as Maru Sushi). While the service was fine, especially for a place just doing a soft opening, it's still a restaurant and I want the food there to also be good.

We ordered a few dishes: Two sushi rolls, miso soup, two yakitori, the takoyaki and agedashi tofu.

As a place calling itself an izakaya, I was expecing small plates and skewers, but instead it felt like any basic sushi restaurant: simple appetizers, entrees and sushi rolls. If you're going to call yourself an izakaya, I think it should be focused around the small plates, the yakitori, and the drinks. And speaking of the yakitori, they were basically just skewered meat you could get anywhere. There was no sauce, just the table soy sauce. The bacon wrapped asparagus was okay, but that's mostly because bacon is relatively hard to screw up. Even with that, it was not crispy. There was no melt-in-your-mouth pork option and the chicken we got was relatively bland.

The takoyaki was probably the highlight of the night, but it's just takoyaki, so nothing super special. It didn't jump out at me as amazing or even really "good," just acceptable.

Now for the sushi. And boy, am I glad this place isn't called Sakanaya Sushi. When I get sushi I'm expecting a few things: quality presentation, quality ingredients and quality textures. I, sadly, got none of these. First up, the Monster Roll. Do not order this. I repeat, just don't order this roll. There's no good texture in the whole thing, no mango taste and the construction was lacking, to put it mildly. Mango slices were falling off the top, too dry or thick to stay in place, and there was something just really weird. I thought there was a white sauce on the top. "Alright," I thought, "let's try their sauce." It was literally just Hellmann's mayonaise. Not even the good Kewpie mayo. It was fully disappointing to eat, and all the textures melded into one another to just be bland.

The next roll was a Treasure Island Roll. Crab, cooked salmon, avocado, fried onion and masago. I thought it would be interesting to get the salmon tempura, as I've never had that in a roll. Now a lot of rolls have tempura in them, or cooked items and things like this, and usually this gives a slight contrast in texture or temperature. It wasn't a fully fried roll, but I thought at least the fried onion was going to be okay. It was not. Once again, the texture of the whole roll (except for the fried onion topping) was exactly the same. The tempura salmon didn't really give me the salmon flavor I like in sushi, and then we get to the fried onions. These were just some salad-topper fried onions. They were not fresh at all. While they helped the texture a tiny bit, they were cold and flavorless. And for some reason they were PILED...

I was excited to see Lafayette's first Izakaya-style restaurant. Unfortunately, I have tried this restaurant three times and most likely will not return. (I'm sorry, I'm from Japan, so I can be picky about Japanese cuisine.)

I know the restaurant business is challenging in Lafayette. We are not in Chicago, so it is hard to serve excellent food matched with beautiful interiors and great service. We don't have that market. Their interior design is excellent, very creative, and feels genuine. However, the contrast between the upscale interior and the low food quality is unfortunately apparent, and it makes the experience further disappointing. I hope the management will at least learn and care a bit about the cuisine itself, not just the profit level, and improve its foods moving forward.

First of all, most of the foods on the menu are unfortunately not authentic. Starting from Sushi, the rice is not properly prepared for Sushi, and fishes are not so fresh and smells pretty old. Most of the rolls are tasteless or have too much mayonnaise or panko; even worse, they taste old. The Sushi was bad the first and third time I visited. It was a little better the second time I visited. (It may be a different chef, no consistency) Unfortunately, I couldn't finish some of the Sushi, and I definitely didn't need a to-go box.

Most of the appetizers are cheap frozen food. (Takoyaki, Croquette, Karaage, Atsu-age, (Fried chicken), etc.) They were mostly okay since it is hard to go wrong with them, but they were not great either. I liked the side salad for Sushi but didn't like the Soba salad. Soba was marinated with mayonnaise again, and I couldn't eat half of the dish.

I tried to find some dishes I could enjoy in this restaurant, but unfortunately, it wasn't easy. Sorry for being critical. I again understand the difficulty running authentic business in a small city. However, I hope this is helpful for the management to find small seeds of improvement for better...

On Saturday 3/9/24 at 4:30pm my family had the most fantastic dinner at Sakanaya!!! Our waitress Zabzi is most welcoming, friendly, great sense of humor, filled our drinks often, and was very attentive!!! Best waitress ever!!! The decorative modern Japanese art is beautiful!!! The lighting and modern Japanese design are just amazing!!! The Chicken Katsu was about the most delicious meal we’ve ever had!!! Although my daughter would say it was the tangerine chicken!!! The miso soup, salad, and zucchini appetizer was also delicious!!! We love this place!!! We are so happy we found this wonderful new restaurant!!!

Today is 3/16/24 Saturday we again dined at Sakanaya at 2:30pm. We were most fortunate to have Zabzi as our waitress again!!! Zabzi is very helpful, friendly , patient and attentive!!! There were many new sushi specials which Zabzi very patiently answered all my husband’s questions about. He decided to try the new red snapper sushi which he loved!!! My husband also loves the monster roll here!!! He also had edamame and the delicious house salad with the most fantastic ginger dressing you’ve ever tasted!!! I ordered the delicious Chicken Katsu again my favorite, I couldn’t decide between the delicious miso soup (best miso soup I’ve ever had or the freshest house salad with the best ginger dressing I’ve ever tasted so I ordered both!!! My daughter is just like me a creature of habit and ordered the delicious tangerine chicken with the fabulous house salad!!! Zabzi again spoiled us with excellent service and a most delightful sense of humor!!! This place just became one of our favorite restaurants!!! We will be back again...