Sushi Lovers is a very small Chinese-run Japanese restaurant, serving average quality sushi for very cheap prices.
I've lived in Richmond for years, and I've always been curious about Sushi Lovers since I've driven past it on the way to and from work more times than I can count. Finally, today I decided to go and check it out while catching up with an old friend and fellow sushi-lover. Unfortunately, I don't have very many good things to say about my experience. I mean, it was okay, but it wasn't great. Let me explain.
Sushi Lovers seats about 10 people, booth-style, at maximum capacity. It is decorated with fake cherry blossom trees and there were also a few cute paintings of nigiri sushi with smiley faces on the walls, like on their restaurant logo banner, which added to the uniqueness of the restaurant.
In terms of overall presentation and ambiance, it felt very kid-friendly and family friendly, which is what I think they were going for, and felt more or less welcoming. The servers were decently friendly and did a fair job in serving my table during my visit. The tea, unfortunately, was never hot for the duration of my visit.
In terms of pricing, Sushi Lovers is probably the most inexpensive sushi restaurant I have ever been to. Big kid's meals for ~$8.00, decently sized bento boxes for ~$10.00, nigiri sushi pieces starting with tuna and salmon at $1.25/piece. If you're really strapped for cash and you want sushi, Sushi Lovers has you covered.
Where Sushi Lovers kinda kicks the bucket for me is in the taste and quality of its sushi ingredients. I mean, yeah, it's not fair for me to rate Sushi Lovers against other higher-end restaurants in Richmond, but at the same time if something doesn't objectively taste good then I feel obliged to tell my honest feelings about it.
I ordered several pieces of nigiri sushi, including tuna, salmon, ikura, uni, tamago, unagi, and inari. I also had one order of their salmon oshizushi and two tuna rolls. My total bill came out to about $40.00 after tips.
Overall, all of the sushi I had at Sushi Lovers was just, at most, okay. The most disappointing part of my meal was easily the piece of ikura nigiri sushi that I had, for $2.25/piece. It was way too salty and had too much of that fishy taste. The ikura also didn't "pop" very well in my mouth as they do when you bite into a quality piece of ikura nigiri sushi.
The uni was decent, but of course the price was too good to be true so I didn't expect much to begin with. The tamago was sub-average in terms of flavour. The tuna and salmon I had throughout my meal didn't feel like it was frozen at all so props to the staff for preparing the fish nicely. The unagi was barely warm when it was served to me and did not come with any sauce on top.
One of the better parts of my dinner was the salmon oshizushi, which came in six pieces for about ~$13.00. The pieces were torched nicely, the sauce was creamy, but a little too salty for some reason at the front-end of each bite, and the slice of jalapeno pepper on top of each gave quite a nice kick. Portion sizes for everything I ordered were decent - not too small and not overly large like Samurai Sushi or Banzai Sushi.
Anyway, I probably will not return to Sushi Lovers. I felt that I could have spent $40.00 at many other places and would have had a much more satisfying dining experience at which to quell my sushi cravings. Maybe my expectations were too high? Sorry, but Sushi Lovers just doesn't do it for me. read more