Shinsei Sushi

Shinsei Sushi is our family’s favorite sushi restaurant. great service, great food. The best sushi in medford!

This is the best sushi place in Medford I’ve been to so far! I love sitting at the sushi bar and watching creation. Everything is fresh and delish, I also try a special and they never disappoint. The salad dressing is good and the tempura as well.

Very good sushi and always friendly service. They have a nice amount of specialty rolls named after some landmarks in the Rouge Valley :) sure it’s in a strip mall but so are quite a few surprisingly good restaurants in Southern Oregon. The tuna tempura appetizer is especially good.

I found this place to be delicious, fast and wonderfully friendly. The Las Vegas was delicious as was the spicy salmon. Such a refreshing perfect lunch. I sat at the bar. The place has very nice decorations.

Had a couple premium rolls and I’ll admit they were really good. Service was ok, didn’t see our waitress much, seems she may have been new? The interior of this place is pretty nice and the prices are just ok.

A great little find. FOOD is good. A little spendy and way too much to choose from but once you narrow down your choice you are almost sure to find a gem. My favorite today was the Dark Seaweed Salad. Bright and fresh with crunchy seaweed, cucumbers and a sweet, slightly salty rice wine vinegarette. Almost everything else was delish. The waitress was not terribly attentive or helpful but not discourteous either. Give it a try. You will be glad you did.

Had the bento box for lunch and it was very good. Went back a few weeks later and had sushi. The food was good but the service needs work. The waitress did not know anything about the food and said she doesn’t like sushi. I am new to sushi and she was the not biggest help when it came to ordering. They forgot the miso soup and then had to ask for water 4 times until they remembered to bring some.

Stuck in Medford with family in the hospital. I have been here 5 times in a week! I’m from San Francisco and we have more Japanese restaurants than we need but this place rates with the best of them…

We just moved here from Northern California and this was our first sushi restaurant experience in Southern Oregon. I was very impressed. The sushi was incredible. My husband loved the poki salad and the prices were very reasonable. This restaurant will definitely be our go-​to sushi place. Great meal!!!

Tried this place after seeing it across from REI/​TJs. Really, it always seemed busy so figured it shouldn’t be terrible for an early dinner.
First thoughts–
I’m in Medford, not Portland and I’m not expecting this place to bewilder my senses. I just want to try it with the most simple items I can call «safe to eat».
Service was good. I can’t stress enough how nice the two young ladies were. But the scowl on the woman’s face (who appeared to be the owner) was a diss.
Yes– The place was clean, other customers seemed repeat and there was a strait-​faced chef behind the counter. I like that. The return people all seemed to get chicken teriyaki, so did I.
The menu–
Couldn’t stand the informal ordering system with the dry erase marker on the laminated sheet. Can’t someone just write my order down? How about sell me on a special? How about something other than «oh, you’re ready?» This style of ordering does not work for sales because next we hear from the server is when our food comes. If someone would have told me «oh man! We have this awesome roll…» I’d have bought it. How about stoneface over there does like a good owner and come ask us herself? Anyway, I get it. Running a business is hard and stressful you poor thing.
Abbreviated code describes each rolls’ ingredients on a laminated sheet and that’s the menu. You get a dry erase pen to order. Pretty non-​original. Made me think «where had that pen had been prior to me touching it, then eating?» Who knows, I’m washing my hands.
There was a key to decipher the code at the bottom of the menu, again can’t stand it. As if to say «how’s your map reading skills? You’re gonna need them to order.» Example: Rainbow Roll/​TM/​AV/​CC/​GO/​Assorted Fish. Took me, personally a long time to read everything, line by line and write «1».
The restaurant–
While waiting for my food, I took a good look around the place. There was a younger gentleman making our food. He was fumbling through a small assortment of stainless trays under a heat lamp which turned out to be the tempura shrimp that was used in my Ashland roll and was subsequently ice cold within my roll. Heat lamps and microwaves. Just no-​go for me. If I wanted microwave or heat lamp food, I’d go to TJs and buy a microwave pizza. I left all but the one initial piece is tried. No I didn’t take it back because I don’t like spit in my food, really.
The presentation on my plate was. Oh heck, let’s pass on that part of the review.
The food–
Edamame was good.
Hot tea $ 1.50 just an 8oz cup, no kettle to refill at my leisure. Not that good in that department.
California Roll– Just ok, $ 4.50 is too much $
Ashland Roll– The tempura shrimp was ice cold. A crispy-​burnt shrimp tail was the crown jewel of my plate which left clues that at one point, my tempura was hot. I obviously had a problem with this roll.
Salmon Roll– Salmon smelled fresh but was not firm. Probably farm raised? Or old? I don’t know, but it wasn’t great either.
The coupe de gras was the teriyaki chicken with rice. It wasn’t bad quality. Just overpriced.
Ending–
I’m going three-​stars because this place is overpriced, sub-​par quality, heat-​lamp food. The place has so much more potential than what I witnessed and I’m disappointed I spent money here.
Sorry, I do not intend nor plan to return.

Average sushi, average prices. Nothing to write home about. The rice was a little on the dry/​hard side, and upon receiving my order of salmon sushi I noticed there was hardly any salmon in it, mainly just crab filling. I probably won’t be returning.

Food: The sushi is average but I really don’t believe the quality of the food matches the price. For what you get it’s just a bit too pricy. I also had the unagi and it is «grilled eel», it was not grilled at all… For the price I paid for it, I felt the work was lacking.
Service: Service wasn’t so bad, it was okay… We got off late at work and came in close to closing. I understand they want to go home but did they really need to say it to our face and make us feel uncomfortable? I guess they don’t like money!
Overall: Would not recommend to people I know.

Shinsei has addressed many of the issues I had with them previously. They removed the wall and created more seating, their food quality has remained high, and their wait staff has stepped up to the plate to be efficient, friendly and responsive. It is our «go to» place for sushi here in the Valley. Clean, fresh, flavorful, good combinations; a winner in my book!

Good sushi (average is probably a better word) but if you are getting it to-​go be sure to speak very clearly about your order. I called in an order and the girl on the phone took my name AND phone number and said it would be ready in 20 min. When I arrived (20 min later) they said they weren’t sure which roll I wanted on the phone… Lol but never called me back to verify? Anyways, not the worst thing ever but inconvenient.
Medford does not have many quality choices for sushi so if you are wanting average sushi, this place will suffice.

Ordered a bento box for lunch pick up. Food was ready fast. Huge portions for a bento box! I got California rolls, which were decent, shrimp tempura rolls which were pretty good too. It also came with miso soup and salad, and chicken teriyaki. I had more then enough food for lunch and dinner.
Food was good. Not great sushi, but good enough.
Environment was nice. I ran in and ran out, but it looked clean and stylish. It was fairly full for a Saturday afternoon as well. The staff all greeted me with smiles when I entered. The hostess was very pleasant and had my food in hand when I paid.

9 dollars for this (check out photo). This place is a joke. The long wait did not help either. I have had way better sushi than this. Maybe i came in the wrong day, but this was not worth my money or time… NEXT!!!

The service, atmosphere were perfect for our early dinner. The jalapeño stuffed with crab Wow.
The combo sushi, sashimi
delectable.
The gomo salad ! Loved it!
A glorious happenstance encounter.
Worthy of your discerning appetite!!!

Clean nice place. Seafood fresh. Not the most epic and actually have had better in albuquerque, new mexico-​no ocean or coast. No Toro
Service nice enough. 11 year old and I had a good time.
Free gyoza appetizer with Unilocal check in and at least a 20 dollar order… nice.

Love, love, love, this place!
Great sushi, friendly staff, and reasonably priced. I love going in for happy hour. They have great deals on sushi rolls during this time.

The sushi was awesome. I was so stoked to see they had tamago!
Although their ramen was no great it was basically cup of noodles with some veggies. Other than that their service was nice and the restaurant was clean and updated.