Special: Sushi Train, Winnipeg MB (2,130 km)

This week's regular installment of Sushipalooza is going to be delayed by a few days, as I am on vacation in beautiful Manitoba. But to ensure I remain in top sushi-eating form, I took time out from my trip to pay a visit to Winnipeg's Sushi Train. I believe there are several locations; the one we went to was in The Forks market area downtown.

Coincidentally, Sushi Train shares a name with a now-defunct establishment back in my home neighbourhood. Toronto's Sushi Train had a conveyor belt running around the room carrying plates of sushi, but Winnipeg's Sushi Train takes the gimmick quite literally, running an actual O-scale train around the sushi bar. They actually weren't running it when we came in, but after my adorable nephew asked nicely, they used it to deliver our order. The kids were delighted.

Being a gimmicky sushi joint in a tourist neighbourhood, I expected Sushi Train to be outrageously expensive, but it was actually surprisingly affordable. Dirt cheap, even. Most of the menu items fall under the $5 mark. Fine dining this ain't.

Cheap and dubiously authentic or not, it was all pretty good. With a party of kids and inadventurous eaters, we steered away from the toro sashimi and stuck with the types of maki that cause sushi purists to protest, "That's not sushi!". Shaddup, sushi purists. Some of us like Teriyaki Chicken rolls. In fact, we liked it so much somebody snapped up part of it before I could get a picture of it.

In the end, a good time was had by all, for the princely sum of about 10 bucks a head. Certainly the most entertaining Sushipalooza outing so far. Choo choo!

Week 6: Sushi Supreme Fusion (0.3 km)

This is the place that started it all... the place I was walking past all those months ago when the idea for Sushipalooza was born. Unfortunately, as was the case with Takumi, by the time I actually got to Sushi Supreme Fusion, the "grand opening" special advertized in the picture above was gone. (Incidentally, another sushi place has opened up nearby this very week, and is of course currently offering a grand opening discount. Will I actually make it to this one before the offer expires? We'll find out in, like, 20 weeks!)

Sushi Supreme Fusion took over the spot vacated by Sunset Grill near Yonge and Wellesley. Given the crumminess of the sign out front, I was rather surprised by the sleek stylishness of their large, bright dining room. The centrepiece, across from the sushi bar, is a large boat-shaped table, complete with ornamental mast. Go with a party of 10 and request -- nay, demand -- to be seated at the boat!

I decided to be kind to my pocketbook resist the temptation to order a whole bunch of items. I really prefer to sample a variety of weird maki, but it's a little hard when you're dining alone. I need more friends, is what I need. But I digress.

So I got a "Sushi Bronze" combo. It contained all the usual suspects, plus a salmon hand roll. Hand rolls are a pain in the butt to eat, I find. I usually try to avoid them, but whatever. Aside from a general dislike for hand rolls, my only complaint with the Sushi Bronze was that the salad was freakin' swimming in dressing. Everything else was perfectly fine.

As an accompaniment, I ordered the intriguingly named "UFO". It's tempura eggplant topped with spicy tuna. Anything with tempura is pretty muck OK by me, but to be honest I didn't much care for the flavour of the spicy tuna. I think spicy tuna is the kind of thing that's better enjoyed in smaller doses than what was presented here.

My biggest regret about Sushi Supreme Fusion was that I didn't order the "Negima Yaki" pictured on the front of their take-out menu. Enoki mushrooms wrapped in grilled steak. Hell yeah. If that's not on the menu at the next place I visit, I may have to pop back in to S.S.F. for a quick snack some day... that wouldn't be breaking the rules, would it?

Week 5: Sushi Sky (0.3 km)

Hello, and welcome to a very special Family Edition of Sushipalooza! This week I had the 3 sushi-eatingest members of my family join me at Yonge St. sushi stalwart Sushi Sky. A mere 2 doors down from upstart Takumi, Sushi Sky has been there for as long as I can remember (however long that is), and is only the second Sushipalooza stop that I've been to before.

Unfortunately, there was a minor tragedy with the food photos. My camera did not seem to appreciate the lighting conditions in there. Guess I should have taken my sister up on her offer to borrow hers. Oh well. I was able to salvage some semi-usable thumbnails, but no larger view. Sorry!

To kick things off, we have the house-special "Sushi Sky Maki", topped with smoked salmon, BBQ eel, and avocado. Oh yeah, and shrimp I think. So pretty much the works. Makes for a fancy presentation, and anything with BBQ eel on it is a winner in my books. All it was missing was something fried. Speaking of which...

Here we (sort of) see the Dragon Roll A. Despite the fact that it didn't come arranged in a dragon shape like the picture in the menu, this one was a big hit. It contains tempura shrimp, which pretty much makes it the next best thing to a Spider Roll.

To round the meal off, we got a selection of... more maki. There was unagi (BBQ eel, as good on the inside of the roll as on the outside), cuttlefish (just for the sake of trying something different), and some Dynamite Rolls (to my disappointment, they didn't contain real dynamite).

I guess the clever thing to do would've been to ask around the table for some opinions I could post here. Oh well. I liked it enough, anyway. Besides, these write-ups aren't supposed to be reviews anyway. So get off my back already!

Week 4: Takumi Sushi House (0.3 km)

Takumi was so close to being in week 3... I actually paced off the distance, and Solo was about 5 steps closer. If Takumi had put their door on the other side of the store, it could have made all the difference! (Or no difference at all, depending on your point of view).

Takumi Sushi House is (for now, at least) the newest contender in the Yonge St. sushi foray, having just opened a couple weeks before the official kick-off of Sushipalooza '09. Unfortunately, by the time I got to them the "Grand Opening" banner pictured above had disappeared, and the 20% off special along with it. They still offer a 15% discount, but only on take-out... a restriction that escaped my notice until the bill came. Oops.

Takumi's menu motto seems to be "an embarrassment of riches". It lists 40-odd appetizers, and that's not including tempura, soup, and salad, each of which have their own section. Add to that over a dozen bento boxes, about 50 varieties of maki, a couple dozen sushi sets and combos, plus various meat, noodle, and "Japanese curry" dishes, and you have some deciding to do.

So of course I ordered a teriyaki beef bento box. What can I say, I'd been craving the various elements all day. It was pretty par for the course... boring salad, decent tempura (though some of the pieces were unmanageably large). The beef was perfectly grilled to a nice rare pink. I've had better gyoza.

I also got what seems to be one of their "signature" rolls, the Clock Tower Crystal roll (named for a feature of the building, not any clock-tower-like attributes of the roll itself). It was pretty good, but a little on the diminutive side for $8.50 if you ask me.

Opening a sushi joint on this strip is a risky -- or foolhardy -- gambit, but Takumi seemed to be doing fairly steady business on a grim Monday evening. All in all, I'd say it would be worth a return visit, if for no other reason than to explore the menu a little more. If you have a craving for variety, Takumi might be just the ticket.

Week 3: Solo Sushi Bekkan (0.3 km)

I can't believe this place has been hiding right under my nose this whole time! It's right around the corner from me, but I didn't really notice it was there until I started doing a thorough inventory of local sushi establishments. This is probably because it's a tiny little place (might seat 12 in a pinch), located on Grosvenor St. and only visible from Yonge if you're looking. Perhaps it's popular at lunch time with YMCA patrons? If it's not, it should be. I'm going to go ahead and call this place a "hidden gem".

The menu included clippings from a rave review of a place in Newmarket called Solo Sushi Ya, which this place is apparently an offshoot of. According to the web site, they only opened about 8 months ago, so I guess they haven't been flying under my radar for that long. Still.

Some of the items on the menu were a little pricier than at some of the numerous sushi dives on the Yonge St. strip, but quite reasonable overall and great value. I mean, sure you can get a $10 bento somewhere else, but your salad's gonna be a chunk of iceberg lettuce with crappy dressing on it. I think I can safely say this was the best salad I've ever been served with a sushi combo. Off to a good start!

I got the "Sushi King" combo (you can see the whole thing below). It included a couple of fish items I'm too dumb to identify, and did not include the ubiquitous Fake Crab Stick sushi. Don't get me wrong, I like fake crab stick, but something tells me it's not very authentic. It also included some very tasty spicy tuna (I think :P) rolls.

Since they have the word "solo" right there in the name, I was all set to go it alone on this one, but at the last minute I managed to coerce someone to go with me again. All the better to sample more menu items! Here we have Salmon Avocado Roll and Shrimp Tempura Roll, both of which got the thumbs-up.

Just as we were leaving, they cooked up what smelled like an order of yakitori for someone. It smelled freaking awesome. Now I want to go back for yakitori, but I kind of have my sushi plate full (so to speak) for the next few months. So I have an assignment for all you legions of loyal readers of this blog: go visit this place and help them stay afloat in Toronto's fickle restaurant business, at least until I get a chance to go back! You won't regret it!^*

(* Management assumes no responsibility for your regrets.)