Oyama Sushi

We arrive at restaurant around 5:45. The hostess says she’ll seat us in a couple of minutes. There are plenty of open tables waiting to be cleaned. 15 minutes later the open tables are marked as reserved and within 5 minutes all are suddenly taken by people who just walked in and have reservations. 15 minutes later we’re still waiting… Time to leave.
On a Saturday night the place was loaded with little kids screaming and running around. It was like being in a elementary school cafeteria.

Really like this place. The sushi is fresh, the place has a nice vibe, and the service is always friendly.

Pricey…
But I’d rather pay a bit more for fresh fish.
I’ve been to lots of sushi places and have been forced to shy away from your run of the mill rolls that are deep fried in tempura or drenched in sauce due to Celiac disease.
This place has gluten free Kikkoman soy sauce (that they switched over because the other one they were using tastes gross and is the worst Tamari I’ve ever had– GOOD JOB ON THE SWITCH!) and every Nigiri or Sashimi I’ve had is on point.
My favorite is the Butter Fish Nigiri (Super White Tuna) which not all sushi places carry unless they’re legit.
I come here for the freshness– the prices are what docked it down because Lafayette. I get it, your location is good but I’d knock a dollar off just to get more people in the door– you’d make more and gain one more star from me.
Staff is friendly and always accommodating.

My boyfriend and I were a little hesitant to try this place because of the mixed reviews about the service, but we are so glad we gave it a shot! It did take about 10 min to be greeted at our table, but once we put our order in, it was smooth sailing. We couldn’t help but to applaud ourselves for ordering what we thought were the perfect choices & amount of food, which is always a struggle for us at sushi restaurants. We started with the board special Sake Toro (TO DIE FOR) & Kampachi nigiri. Then had a Golden Bear roll Salmon Crunch Lover roll (#44). Both rolls were outstanding. Very complex favors and textures. We’ve had a few rolls at the Walnut Creek Oyama that we would never order again so were really happy to find how good these two were. All in all, great experience and we will be back again soon!

very good salmon sushi ans very good goyza!

LOVED the sushi here! Im a huge fan of fun rolls with lots of sauces and they nailed it here. I searched through the photos of all the rolls on Unilocal and they definitely put a lot of work into the presentation. I can’t wait to go back and try more of their rolls.

I love this place! It is my go-​to for sushi in the Orinda/​Lafayette area. It is always delicious, service is always good and friendly. We also order ahead and take out on occasion and are never disappointed. But it’s always better sitting in. My daughters 6 and 8 love this place as well. The rolls are delicious and fresh.

Amazing! Food is to die for and staff makes everyone feel welcome. We’ve known these guys since the restaurant first opened and they treat us like family. The atmosphere is great and very inviting.

I’ve eaten here twice. Both times had a really great meal. The sushi is very fresh (critical.duh!) so only compliments on the food. The only trouble is the service really is not great. First time I visited was with a girlfriend We sat at the bar and had to keep catching the attention of someone to get sake/​wine, water, take our order after which the wait for food was quite long. I visited a few weeks later because the meal was so good. This time made a reservation thinking that might help. Again, long wait for them to take our order and very slow with bringing the food. I have to say, while the food is very good, the experience is such that I hesitate going back unless I have time to kill.

The most recent meal we had is a toss up. I’d say it averaged to a 3.5. I ordered tempura because I wanted something nice and crispy that night, but also wanted to finish with my signature favorite dessert — amaebi! :)
When I lived down in LA, I used to frequent this awesome local Japanese restaurant called Maru in Arcadia, CA. It was right across the street from Din Tai Fung. The owner was ethnic Japanese and he was hilarious. He was also good at creating things on the fly. But how I really got to know a bit about cooking tempura was that I took home gallons of his old oil for my homebrew biodiesel still :) So a couple of things I learned: 1) oil quality — very important. Vegetable oil is not the right kind. You can taste it if they use it. I’m pretty confident they use veggie oil. 2) Longevity of oil. The longer the oil is used, the more free radicals remain in the oil. In English, it tastes heavy on your tongue. 3) Batter. Watch any Youtube video. There’s a way to get the batter light and crisp using ice water. Not sure about if they do it here but the results (crispy light crust) wasn’t on par with Maru’s (no longer in business) or most other places I’ve ordered tempura.
Ok enough pontificating because I’m no expert at cooking tempura — it’s hard. Tried it many times. But I know good when I taste it and unfortunately the tempura here didn’t hit the mark b/​c the batter was less than crisp and the oil was weighing heavy on my tongue.
On another note, the amaebi was excellent. They also fry the head too, which is a nice touch because I eat that head like a zombie. Just kidding, I have better table manners than that. But the amaebi was really fresh and was a good «save». That said, it is one of the more expensive ($ 10) for nigiri sushi on the menu.
Fiancé got some fancy roll wrapped in avocado and some kind of sauce. She seemed to enjoy it. She likes this place too. We will continue to explore the menu some more.

We absolutely love Oyama Sushi, and go there for a dinner treat on payday every 2 weeks:-) We are quite discerning when it comes to Sushi, and also keep a tight budget, but Oyama is worth every penny and is a cut above the rest that we have tried. Their wine pour is generous so one glass is plenty for me… and the rolls are amazing. Over the last year we have discovered our favorites, and there are many of them, so we never get bored. We always finish with 2 serving of Hamachi and just love it.
We sit early, it does sometimes get busy. The service is impeccable and we always enjoy our chats with the staff. Parking is never a problem in back, to avoid the Trader Joe’s nightmare parking.

This is the best sushi place I have ever gone to. It’s nice and cozy and the sushi plates we ordered are just gorgeous prepared and presented. The fishes are very fresh and delicious. Everything was great and we had a memorable night here. Thank you!

This place was really good. The amount of reviews threw me off but I gave it a try and I was surprised on how good the food was

Absolutely one of our favorite places for dinner here in Lafayette. My fiancé’ isn’t exactly a seafood lover so he frequents the teriyaki chicken platter (which I would totally get if I wasn’t into sushi myself) — I however LOVE sushi and sashimi and always get the sushi and sashimi combo platter. The fish is always fresh and very good. They even introduced me to butterfish (trust me, you have to try it!) I’ve been to numerous sushi joints all over the state and still find this one to have the freshest tasting fish. The started salad that I get with my sashimi combo has the tastiest dressing! I need to get them to bottle it up for me sometime.
We also love Eddie, who is more often than not our server– he’s super friendly and goes out of his way to make sure my fiancé’ and I are cared for.
Fiancé’ and I make sure to come here at least twice a month for a quick, delicious, and healthy meal.

Meh. The few times I’m out this way I see a lot of people here so I decided to finally try it thinking it must be good of its always packed.
Honestly, it was not that great. The staff was a bit stiff and I asked for water with no ice and got ice. There was a younger girl who was working who was very sweet and was basically the entire customer service of the restaurant, everyone else was kind of «let’s get you in and out quickly»
The rainbow roll I got was meh. I can’t put my finger on it, just meh.

First time here.
Unilocal ratings are strange sometimes. The best rated «sushi» restaurants, 4.5 stars, are Chinese food places in Moraga that also serve sushi. This place and Blue Gingko both earn 3.5 stars but are excellent.
Had jalapeño role, salmon nigiri, and poke roll. All were excellent quality and filling. The jalapeño roll was fairly creative and had me liking albacore which I usually don’t

We went to the restaurant today around 1 PM, the place was about 60% full, only one waitress who handled both eat in and takeouts so the services were slow. We ordered simple lunches, Salmon Teriyaki and Beef Teriyaki, after miso soups were served, the food came in the comb dishes, one side of the dish was the meat and their other side was rice with 4 – 5 skinny asparagus, nothing else. The Salmon was tiny, although the beef was ok, asparagus were tiny and dry, not very appetizing. We are very disappointment.

I’m giving 3 stars because the first roll they brought out was delicious. IF I ever go back I’d just order two Hot Mamasita rolls. The hot Jalapeño roll was nasty. It was soaked in some sour red jalapeño sauce that made the roll unpalatable. The third roll was the Under the Sea roll and was pretty flavorless… wasn’t bad but wasn’t good either. I was disappointed, the meal started off so well
3 rolls plus two orders of Octopus Nigiri about $ 55.

My favorite sushi place in Bay Area. I’ve tried almost everything in here. Sushi and kitchen items. They had never let me down. The large variety makes everybody happy when my family had dinner there. My mom, who is not a huge fun of the original raw fishes loves the Jalapeño Jumper which has really rich flavor. My stepfather, who doesn’t like raw fish very much, got a specially designed roll with all cooked stuff from the sushi chef. And it was exactly what he liked! For me, I ordered a bunch of nigiris, which I cannot think of any word to describe other than PERFECT.
Decent environment
Attentive service
Really FRESH fishes!
What else should I expect?

Wow Amazing sushi! Love. This. Place!!! Staff is very attentive and friendly. I had been to a lot of sushi restaurant, this is my favorite Sushi restaurant so far.
Me and my friends visiting Oyama Sushi for the first time and had a great experience.
We were sitting at the sushi bar, so we can watch how the chef prepare every single piece of sashimi and nigiri that we ate. We order a sashimi combo, the fishes was extremely fresh, tender and beautifully cut. Four Season Roll, (Omg it was glorious how it turn out). Lafayatte roll was recommended by Chef Peter (The flavor and texture are just perfect, one of my favorite). We also order some nigiris: aji, unagi, salmon roe, uni (sea urchin and amaebi (sweet shrimp) it so sweet and melts in your mouth.
Thank you, Chef Peter for the recommendation, the food was so delicious. We really enjoyed our dinner. We will definitely going back!!!
I highly suggest everyone to try this place. Prices are great for the high quality.