Masa Sushi

First time here and I’m sold. Great looking restaurant, friendly staff, great music and great sushi.
I read a few others complaining about the portions and how they were too big… they’re right. The sushi is a little larger than some other places, and I’m not going to complain about that! Definitely not single bite sushi, but you’ll pay the same at other places for less… madness! My wife and I orders the same amount that we usually do at any other sushi restaurant: appetizers, some sushi and two rolls. I’ve never had to ask for a sushi to-​go box before.
Atmosphere was excellent, playing 80’s and 90’s music.

The food is so good for the price. Miso soup was delicious. Also got the hibachi sirloin steak during lunch hour for $ 10.50 and it was amazingly good. Will definitely come back again. My hubby got the Bonita sushi which he gave a 3.5 out of five.

This place is great. I’m there on a weekly basis. As have been for years. I try other sushi spots and am only disappointed and wished I would of come here. People when people tell me they go to some other sushi spot I think in my head «what’s wrong with this person» I get the chef special every time. See photo below. That’s 12.50 usd.

Spot on reviews here. Unilocal said it was a 4 star and I have to agree.
We decided to go for lunch on a Sunday. There was a fairly decent crowd, but not too crowded. We were seated promptly and the waitress soon appeared. We decided to take our time and look at the menu. As I was looking at the menu, I was thinking to myself, «These prices are pretty high even as far as sushi goes.» As a warning, this place should not have $$, it should be $$$. Prices are too high and this is why I took away a star. We ordered the Philly roll, the El Camino roll, and a teriyaki chicken bento box. The salad and soup came first. These are part of the bento box. The salad is just a bagged salad mix with a very runny peanut dressing. A little disappointing but not terrible. The miso soup was very nice and had food flavor. The Philly roll came next. There were 8 pieces and the size was pretty good. Very fresh and flavorful salmon. No complaints here. The bento box was next. It was a nice size, but for $ 12 I expected more. I’ve been to many places where you have the same amount of food of similar quality that cost me $ 7. So I think it is very over priced. Any way, the flavor of everything was good. Very tasty fried rice as well. So that was all good. The el dorado roll came last. It had 6 pieces and all was of a good size. Very good flavor. Their spicy tuna is good, not too spicy, and doesn’t have a bad fishy flavor that some places have.
All in all, not a bad place. The taste of all the main things was fabulous, but at what cost??? I think the taste was a 5 star, the cost was a 3 star. Averaging out to a 4 star rating. I want to go back, but I may go in search of sushi that is more reasonably priced. As good as it was, it is hard to justify the cost when I have had just as good sushi else where for 30% less.

Stopped here for a late lunch/​early dinner and sat at the bar. the edamame is ok and could use some sea salt when served. Their sangria is surprisingly good and worth the price. The lighter sangria are under-​appreciated and taste wonderful. The unagi sushi are served with generous pieces. The one disappointment is the rice. With each piece of sushi and the caterpillar roll, the rice offsets what would otherwise be a great roll I would wholly recommend. Everything else is really nice about this restaurant. Looking around, there are families, couples and singles throughout. The server is a ninja, refilling my water without me even noticing it. A small detail, but a nearly lost art. The hostess was genuine and welcoming. If your’e new to sushi, or old-​hat, this is the place for you.
A very annoying helpful hint is that the receipt calculates what a tip is at 18, 20 and 25%. This is very petty. When you think about the amount of service, water refills and they brought your meal, it is pretty actually pretty embarrassing to consider these servers on the same level as others establishments where I have tipped in the 25% range. I am an avid supporter of paying a large gratuity to professionals who earn that at such places like the servers at Del Friscos, Brenners, Ruth’s or Taste of Texas.

Go here for lunch and get their bento box! So much food for just $ 10-​$ 12! Nice friendly staff. Their water doesn’t taste weird like other restaurants. Definitely a try if you are in the area. Oh and if you are feeling sushi, order Honolulu roll or the spicy scallop hand roll. If not then order the fried yaki udon dish with chicken. VERY GOOD!

Wow what a let down after our last visit to Masa Sushi. I guess they are also expanding… which may explain a few things.
Walked in… nobody for 2 minutes, Sushi Chef pointed at sushi bar so sat down there… waited another 7 minutes and nobody helped us. Staff rushing around frantically and finally asked the chef do we order through you? or ask for a waiter? He said ok I’ll get you one in some language, it wasn’t English.
One star is for keeping gluten-​free soy sauce on hand, the rest was a disaster. These sushi rollers who were working that night (none of which were Japanese) made some of the worst sushi rolls I’ve ever seen. The first start the fish was fresh, tasty, but the rolls were oiled down to the point not one of our rolls the entire night stuck together. As soon you as picked it up with a chop stick it fell apart, this was on all 5 of our rolls we ordered. You can see the oil standing in a puddle on the side of our plates.
We also ordered the Nasa Roll 1 which I’ve had before and was excellent, this time it came out and my first bite tasted like raw spoiled fish and I spit it back out. I told our waiter and he said let me ask a manager, I also gave him the roll to take back. He comes back and takes off $ 6.00 instead of comping the entire roll off our ticket.
For over $ 100 worth of sushi, the night we went was complete crap, the sushi was amateur, and the edamame we ordered was frozen in the middle. Our sake and miso soup was best part of the meal. I usually give shots another chance, but this was my last time. Good luck.

Love this place! Huge pieces of sushi! Love their happy hour pricing and the amount of fish you get with your sushi! Crab wontons also delicious! Currently they are undergoing an expansion. I can not wait for their reopening!

I think I come here for dinner at least once a month with my family. My family love most of the sushi rolls here. We have a «no cell phone during dinner» policy thing so too bad I do not have any photos for the amazing rolls they make here. I visited here on a Saturday noon when I was out of ideas where to have lunch. I made a bold move to dine in here, alone, on a Saturday. The place was half-​full with couples and families. There were no way i could finish a sushi roll alone, so I ordered Nabeyaki Udon.
It was the very first time I ordered Udon here, and probably the last time too. The noodles were put in a steamy hot steel bowl, with the tempura shrimp on the side like other Japanese restaurants in town. The soup was so blank though. I mean Japanese soups often do not have many flavors/​spices, but very pure instead, however the soup here was just blank. I feel like I am eating noodle with meats in a slightly– saltier-​than-​water broth. This is sadly true for other Japanese restaurants I’ve tried in Houston too. I’ve tried Nabeyaki noodle in Japan and South Korea and it was so much better there. I found the only place that make close to authentic version of this soup is a restaurant in San Antonio (a very famous one).
I guess I will stick to sushi rolls next visits.

Friday at 18:00, party of three.
El Dorado roll, shrimp hibachi, miso soup, salad with ginger dressing, Sapporo.
Healthy crowd upon arrival, however was able to be seated immediately. Packed once we left at 19:30.
Sushi, appetizers and entrée served promptly. Typical soup and salad. More shrimp and less veggies compared to other Japanese restaurants I’ve been to.
Minor things kept it from a perfect score. Asked for fried rice, received regular rice, was corrected eventually. Had to ask for spicy mayo twice, had eaten more than half my food before I finally got it. Then asked for a box for my wife’s leftovers, she had our 7 month old in her arms, waiter placed the box in front of her so she could put it in herself.
Overall food and atmosphere were good, wait staff performance could have been better.

Masa’s 10^th year here. What a crowd. A far cry from the first month, when the place was empty and Michael was worried if he made the right decision. You did, my friend! Congratulations.

The Bayou roll was fantastic. The waiter, Kyle, really made it a great experience though. We had plenty of questions and he was very knowledgable.

Was very excited this place came to Friendswood and it was pretty good. BUT THE SUSHI ROLLS ARE HUGE. The point of a roll is that it’s is bite-​sized, so that all in one bite you get to taste the marriage of all the different foods wrapped In the roll. Here a single slice of roll takes 2 – 3 bites to finish the roll and it ends up falling all apart. Defeats the entire point.
Anyways, loved the atmosphere, people were great. Just missed the mark on one of the main points and enjoyment of sushi.

It’s currently closed for renovations to give us more wiggle room. I’m looking forward to seeing what it will look like when it’s done.
They have 2 other locations, one in Dickinson which I’m not a fan of & a brand new one in Friendswood which I have yet to try. I know they have a ladies night on Tuesday where you get a free glass of wine with your meal but I can’t remember which one is the 50% off night.
They do offer GF options but ask them about the details & make sure the sauces don’t have any gluten is there.
It’s my other go to sushi place in this area. The sushi is ok but I prefer the rolls here. Love @ first sight, John Wayne & grasshopper are interesting flavors.
They do have udon noodle dishes & bento boxes as well.
It’s better than ichibon but not as good as michiru, good spot for lunch.

Sushi is ok, didn’t wow me. Asked a waiter for something that will wow me but I ended up wowing myself with the roll I had in mind. Place is very nice and waitress is super nice. Overall food is ok but I wasn’t wowed for a soon to be fusion sushi

I finally allowed my friends to take me back here after my last experience here.
I’m glad I went. This time the Miso Soup was hot and had a great taste. The salad that came with the Chef’s Choice daily special was cold and crisp and had a decent ginger dressing. Could have used a little more ginger taste but it was acceptable.
The sashimi was really good. Very fresh and tasty salmon. There was one piece of spicy tuna sushi with great tuna flavor. The rest of the sushi was acceptable. Decent rice and fresh ingredients but the seaweed wrappers were still slightly soggy. If I had the option I would rate this restaurant three and a half stars.

First impression: typical strip mall sushi place. Decent place to get your sushi fix at a reasonable price
The pluses:
The choice of music was surprisingly awesome (80’s hits) which had me tapping my toes.
The Bayou Roll: a spicy crawfish California roll. Yum!
The minuses:
Menu was a bit thin (unless you love salmon which appears in nearly every roll).
Server was a bit uneducated on the menu and had to ask one of chefs what some ingredients were.
Presentation of the rolls is an afterthought. One roll was so loosely made letting it dropped into my soy sauce and splashed all over my clothes. Slices weren’t even, and had no special garnish or arrangement.
Would I go back? Maybe. It was just OK in my opinion but maybe this is damn good sushi for Houston.

Pretty neat place! Tonight is ladies night so I got a free wine so keep in mind (Thursday).
Garlic edamame is delicious!
Spicy tuna hand — roll is not crispy enough.
Sushi is okay. (I guess I’m comparing with Nobu or Sugar Fish…) but «ladies night» is a great customer service and good promotion.

First, I will start with the service. It was beyond excellent. I think our server may have also been the manager, but either way we felt like we were special from the beginning. We were offered a free appetizer of edamame for no reason. As we were enjoying our first serving of sushi, she then brought out sake for us and said it was on the house. After our second serving of sushi we couldn’t eat it all, and she took one of the rolls off of our bill. We couldn’t figure out what we did to get taken care of so well.
The sushi was excellent. The portions are very large and they have a big selection of rolls to choose from.
We will definitely be going back!!!

Big portions, but overall quality is less than what I’ve had at other sushi places. Did not see one Asian in the staff, save the hostess…
Ambiance
Kinda tacky. Slightly outdated feel, kind of like a half-​hearted attempt at a beachy feel that doesn’t quite make it. Hopefully they learn that Ladies’ Night is not spelled Lady’s Night.
Food
Orders came out faster than expected for a party of six. My standard for rice is higher at Japanese and Korean restaurants. That being said, the rice here was worse than what I’ve had at Chinese places. Clumpy and lukewarm, it was the saddest part of my lunch bento. The katsu don fried pork was dry and tough, and the egg rolls tasted like the frozen kind from Costco (but tbh those aren’t that bad lol). California roll pieces were aight, so perhaps I’d get sushi/​sashimi if I ever came again.
I had a few bites of my mom’s tempura udon and the broth was okay, slightly salty. Fried shrimp and eggplant were okay as well, breading wasn’t overly thick. Noodles themselves were a bit too soft though.
Service
Our server was cool. Offered edamame, refilled glasses, and was overall pleasant.
Tl;Dr the only thing you might come here for is the portion-​to-​price ratio, otherwise you’re better off checking out another more authentic Japanese place.

Came to meet a friend here for lunch.
Ordered the Lunch Special set 1, which was an array of sashimi, nigiri sushi, and a tuna roll. The LS1 came with a salad and soup. For 16.99, the price was pretty good for the amount of sashimi I was getting. Not to mention, it was all fresh.
Portions may be too big though. I couldn’t finish my entire meal. Luckily my friend was able to take the rest home.
Hopefully I can try some of their specialty rolls next time.