Nikki’s Fresh Gourmet & Sushi downtown — Restaurant in Wilmington

After wandering from one packed downtown eatery to another on a Saturday night, my wife and I stumbled across Nikki's more out of desperation than deliberate intent. As accidental finds go, we could have done far worse.

First, a caveat: it was very busy at the time of our visit. As such, the restaurant was somewhat loud, and the servers, though not rude, definitely seemed a bit harried. Whether or not this is par for the course is something only a local/repeat offender would know.

Moving on, Nikki's menu defies expectations. Sushi is the specialty here, and the offerings strike the right balance between traditional rolls and more eclectic house specialties. You'll also find the requisite bento boxes and teriyaki dishes. However, Nikki's offers poke bowls (Hawaiian), burgers and cheesesteaks (American), tacos and quesadillas (Tex-Mex), and gyros and falafel hummus wraps (Mediterranean) as well. Curious as this is, it makes for a multitude of options.

My wife and I went with a tofu teriyaki bento box and a rainbow poke bowl, respectively. The food came out more quickly than we would have expected given the volume, and while quality ranged from acceptable to outstanding, nothing was a real misfire. The poke bowl (salmon, tuna, white tuna, seaweed salad, cucumber, avocado, and dressing over rice) was bright, fresh, and bursting with flavor. For $13.95, I wished there was more of it, but what I got tasted great. The bento box, on the other hand, provided plenty of food for $11.95: teriyaki tofu, miso, a side salad with ginger dressing, gyoza, four pieces of California roll, and edamame. Few of the items were stellar, but the tofu was flavorful and the miso was comforting.

If Nikki's sushi rolls are as good as the hype suggests and if the restaurant isn't always packed, I could see rating it higher. As-is, the varied menu and competent execution make it a...

We made a reservation since we knew it was going to be packed. There was no hostess or waitstaff taking names or providing wait times. I had to walk practically into the kitchen to confirm with a waitress who we were and to take the seats reserved for us. 20 minutes go by with nothing. No biggie it's packed and we were not in a hurry.

We finally get drinks ordered then 20 more minutes pass without us being able to order. We flag down our waiter and ask if he knows who our server is. In the meantime the table behind and in front of us has had food ordered and delivered. Turns out the guy who has been serving them is our waiter! He makes some passive aggressive comment about how it's crazy and people have been sitting at tables that aren't even ready yet ... and then looks at us pointedly. Um - we made a reservation and sat in our assigned area.

Once we ordered food it came quickly but getting any service at all from this guy required arm waving. He seemed to make a point of ignoring our table. He messed up our drinks and forgot to ask for the side of an entree until mid meal so it was brought pretty late.

Which brings us to the food. It was passable. The pork gyoza and salad was quite good but the sushi? Loosely packed, rice over cooked, too much wasabi on the rolls and fell apart with chopsticks. There is much better sushi in Wilmington elsewhere! Miso soup tasted store bought.

I ordered the Salmon bento box and my husband ordered three specialty roles. The Salmon was awful! It's sad to say but I have had fresher better Salmon at a Sakura in Missouri than here and you can't get much further from the ocean. There was no skin on the salmon and the cut had clearly been frozen probably even cooked from frozen. The rice in the bento was also not cooked right. Won't...

Yikes! This used to be my favorite sushi spot downtown for two reasons:

1. always quick
2. staff was great Went tonight with my mother and my son. We were ready to make a big sushi order. There were 2 servers and maybe 5 other tables in the entire restaurant. The sushi chefs were both just literally standing there on their phones. I think awesome- let’s order a feast every table except one already has food, this will be nice & quick. Nope. I watched our server put together two separate take out orders while walking past our table no joke, 8 different times without a single word. I tried to polity make eye contact- eye contact happened twice- still she didn’t say a word to us. Then I watch her go and get a sheet of paper which looked to be a new online order, this is AFTER packing the two take out orders, walk past us again and go straight to a computer console to start keying in this online order. Meanwhile we’re just sitting there and had been sitting there ready to order for a good 7-10 minutes. Definitely not how things used to run in there. You figure with that little business inside the actual restaurant they would take care of in person customers before very blatantly ignoring them to tend to take out orders. Or at least take care of the in person customers in between takeout orders not ignore them for what seemed like three separate bagged orders in a row. We ended up just leaving and going across the street for sushi and way...