Sakura Sushi

Ever since Andoh closed shop years ago ive been looking for a new Sunnyvale Japanese restaurant to step up. Unfortunately Sakura was not it. Katsu and soft shell crab were acceptable, but no where near the heAvenly version, Andoh made. Looks like it too is folding shop but i dont think it will be too sorely missed, especially with Rokko re emerging down the way

They let the two toddlers is our party run around the place. they have a very large menu and the food is okay. FYI the miso soup has fish sauce, but they do have a veggie friendly bento box. The prices are reasonable and the staff is super friendly.

Sushi is either an amazing experience or not. And this was. I read the bad reviews and maybe things improved as I will for sure come back. I make my own sushi and know good from bad. This place did not disappoint.

Staff was super friendly when we walked in. The server gaves us water immediately with lots of ice (my favorite!!).
Good selection of items… The list of rolls are so long it took me awhile to read all of them!
Fish was fresh and the hamachi Kama was the meatiest I’ve ever seen… With a whole side of lemon… Yum!
The dancing ebi was tasty, especially good for my non-​raw-​fish eating cuzzo.
The golden eye nigiri is pretty unique… Scallop and tuna chopped together on rice with sauce and tobiko on rice wrapped in big pieces of tuna… Definitely worth the $ 7 price tag.
Last but not least, my true test was the amaebi… Sweet shrimp nigiri. Yes, it did come with the fried heads!!! :)
Yay, will be back when I’m in the area!
Side note, free parking after 6pm in the parking lot in back or garage down the street :)

I came here for lunch and got the katsu don. I was a bit disappointed at the price ($ 15) as I had placed a phone order off an old menu, but the portion looked on the larger side. They are really speedy here and I didn’t have to wait long for my food. The katsu itself was ehh, okkkk… nothing especially good or bad… probably like a larger version of the prepacked food you can get at the japanese grocery store for less.

Well, they give you complimentary green tea here instead of water… which was kind of cool. For all of my waxing poetic and pretentious ramblings on about tea, I’m actually not the biggest fan of green tea. Nor am I exactly a purist. I have no problem admitting that the tea could have benefited from an accompanying honey bear. Having said that, though, it was still more fun than water. Also, let’s face it, green tea is better than no tea any day of the week.
And that’s how the meal started; with tea sans honey bear. The group then proceeded to order every piece of sushi the house had to offer, or, at least, that’s how it looked to me when the food came. Plates upon plates of this kind of sushi, and that kind of sushi… giant rolls of rice with giant pieces of sad fish wrapped inside, or draped on top. One with a tail hanging out of it. I’m told this is normal. At any rate, everyone seemed to enjoy the food, because there was none left by the time we were ready to leave. For my part, I had some cucumber and avocado vegetarian sushi. For what my opinion on the subject is worth, it was honestly the best vegetarian sushi I’ve had, and I’ve been subjected to quite a few. It’s probably my least favorite food on the planet, but I found it palatable here.
Oh, oh… and the edamame was good. Not as good as the place we’d eaten at the previous night, but edamame is always good. Wondrous green pods of magic filled with delicious bursts of soy bean tastiness. As far as I’m concerned, they’re the best thing on the menu at any Asian restaurant. Feel sorry for me; I’m a vegetarian.
I was originally going to give 3 stars, but that wasn’t exactly fair given my natural propensity toward disliking this type of food. Everyone else at the table left pleased and full. That always makes it worth it.

Lets just say I was pretty surprised of the quality of sushi here.
They didn’t have much to choose from, looks like they’re know for fried rolls too.
I tried their sashimi special and this was pretty darn good. Maybe it was a good night and the fish was fresh? But I’ll sure update once I go back and see if the quality changes, but the fish was almost melt in your mouth delicious.
Service was good and food was good, I’ll be back and hope the quality doesn’t change on me!

— — LUNCH ONLY — — –
Good place to satisfy your sushi craving during work hours. It’s consistent, gets the job done, isn’t overly crowded during lunch peak hour and is reasonable in price. Ordered the ama ebi sushi and rainbow roll – really standard dishes and both came out exactly like I expected them to. Consistency is key people.

I’m still in a Sushi Mood. So I rolled the Work Whip to Sakura they are located on Murphy Street in Sunnyvale on Restaurant Roll. I wander in and I am Greeted and Seated .
I ordered the 13 Piece Sashimi Dinner for $ 18.95. It come with Miso Soup and a Garden Salad. Fish was fresh, Pieces were average size .
I also ordered a Rock and Roll roll. It was really tasty.
The restaurant was decorated nice and had a LCD TV for Entertainment.
Prices were a little higher than average.

This place isn’t as good as I thought. I think the title looks and sounds better than their actual sushi/​food HAHA. Sakura is a pretty nice and friendly looking restaurant. It has the underground Japanese look to it. They have a boat bar which is cool and its pretty spacious. My gf and I sat outside of the shop instead only because there was a nice mini jazz festival going on outside. The service led by this woman was cool. She had a bubbly personality and she did serve right on time. She did her part in refilling tea and picking up after our finished soup and salad.
My gf and I ordered 2 orders of Chirachi which contains 3 slices of salmon, red snapper, halibut, seaweed, crispy noodles, sweet egg, and rice. It was a pretty good size for $ 16. I’m a huge fan of sashimi and the quality of fish in sushi. I def thought the fish sucked. I could tell it wasn’t fresh because it had a sticky texture to it and the it smelled fishy. It wasn’t clean. I honestly thought it was a day old or even expired today. Gross.
It only tasted ok only because we were hungry otherwise this place sort of sucks ass LOL.
*** This place is too expensive. Not good quality fish here :/

This is the Bay Area; here, more than anywhere else in the US, I expect more from my sushi joints here.
Sakura? Well…
The good:
1) They had some veggie rolls I hadn’t seen before. I really liked the kanpyo. I give them a point for variety.
The mediocre:
1) The service. The waitress wasn’t bad, per se. But she certainly wasn’t good.
The ugly:
1) The tempura batter was thick, and the tempura was just the wrong side of overcooked. I tried taking the batter off of one piece, and discovered uncooked bits of tempura batter on the inside. Needless to say, I didn’t finish that piece.
2) Price. If I wanted a 2 item bento box with meat, it was $ 14.95. If I wanted a 2 item veggie bento box, it was $ 14.95. Excuse me? The veggie bento box should be cheaper than the meat one.
3) Tea was mediocre. As another reviewer said, it basically tasted like hot water.
Would I go back? Not unless there was nowhere else open to eat…

Another five star sushi restaurant in the south bay. I’ve ha a small sampling of some very authentic Japanese sushi. Well worth a return trip, however at dinner time to get the full treatment from these wonderful restauranteurs!

two more visits and they are very reliable so far — they’re not selling old fish. Nigiri as follows:
* Uni — still available from Santa Barbara — very sweet, tight, not runny — wonderful. (I kinda miss the more robust musky flavor of nor-​cal uni, but prefer Santa Barbara).
* Hamachi — wonderfully fresh, sweet, buttery, and very generous portions.
* Ahi — was just ok, but it wasn’t toro.
* Ikura — again, very nice.

Dish Dash across the street was crowded so we decided to go to Sakura Sushi. The waitress was upbeat and attentive, but the food service was a bit slow. Got my tempura bento box before Titanic roll (took forever might I add).
Tea: tasted like diluted hot water (and yes, tea is supposed to be pretty good at a sushiya)
Tempura + sashimi bento box: Tempura consisted of shrimp, potato, an onion ring, yam, and broccoli. Sashimi consisted of 4 slices of salmon sashimi on a bed of shredded daikon. Either the batter was too thick and/​or oil temperature was too low, but the tempura was a little too greasy. I had to hack at the tempura to get rid of some of the batter. Tempura batter should be lighter, with a more crispy and airy texture.
Titanic roll: I’m not a very big fan of these types of rolls. They why did I order it you may ask? I did not. The bf did. Heavy on the red sauce with loads of mayo loaded crab salad on top. I couldn’t taste anything but the sauce and mayo.
Food was meh, but will give credit for the nice waitress though!

Ok, I looooove sushi and Japanese food.
But this place. Awful. After the first time coming here, I tried their BASIC California roll and their beef teriyaki. The roll was too mushy & tasteless. The teriyaki so tough, dry and not edible.
I went again, to give it another try, and I ordered their dragon roll special. the pieces of sushi were not cut all the way, there was no flavor other than the dousing of sauce. Never will I go here again.

Not too bad at all. I think I may have found my default sushi spot.
I wasn’t in the mood for some overcomplicated roll… I wanted to go the simple route — sashimi. I opted for one of their sashimi combos, which included 16 pcs (of 4 kinds of fish) along with miso soup and a small side salad.
The soup? Decent.
The salad? Small but nice. More of a fan of the peanut sauce they used as a dressing.
The fish? Fresh, clean, tasty.
It’s getting the simple things right that really count in my book, and Sakura delivered in spades on that. I’ll have to try one of their rolls or another combo next time… but there WILL be a next time, for sure.

Got an urge for some quick fix of raw sea creatures, so my friend and I headed down to my neighborhood sushi restaurant. It’s a little dim lit restaurant right in the middle of Murphy ave.
People seem pretty friendly here. As I was browsing through the menu, I got more and more overwhelmed. On one page of the menu, I felt like there was over 50 rolls! It made it really difficult to make my selection.
The food was good, tasted pretty fresh. Actually, I can see the chef slicing pieces of the fish out and rolling the rolls. That might of had boosted the taste factor. The prices were extremely high! One of the most expensive Japanese restaurant I’ve ever been to.
Maybe if the prices were a little lower, I would give this place another shot.

Don’t get anything but the rolls here! Don’t do it! The other «regular» fare … i.e. teriyaki anything, bentos and etc. just don’t do Sakura justice. We order a whole bunch of rolls and we’re rarely disappointed.
The service is known to be slow, but the last few times we’ve visited they’ve been very attentive. I think it depends on who is working.
My favorite rolls are listed in my previous reviews. And remember, order the rolls!

I decided to sit right up at the sushi bar, and watch the «sushi artist» go to town. The fish looked old and all dried up. I watched the guy open a beer, drink it, use the phone, and then make the sushi. without washing his hands, it really grossed me out.
I didn’t have the heart to get up and walk out, so I ordered some of the safest items on the menu… Miso Soup, and Vegetables Tempura. I probably wouldn’t go back to this place, especially considering there are other options for sushi really close by.

The term «nothing to write home about» fits this place well. It’s your standard bay area Japanese restaurant, with average food and average prices, though the sushi is slightly under par.
The service here is badly in need of improvement. For instance: When I asked my waitress what kind of nigiri was offered on the 6-​piece sushi sampler, she said she didn’t know, and just stared at me, flat-​footed, making no attempt to find out. After I persisted, she said there was a mix of things (duh…really?), listed one or two items she knew of, but again made no attempt to ask someone. Geez… and here I was, thinking restaurants were trying harder in these tougher times!
Lunches I’ve had here:
– Teriyaki chicken entrée: Gigantic portion with good quality and value. $ 8.60; Not quite enough rice. The waitress kept giving me funny looks, like I was the untrustworthy type. No idea why. Weird.
– 6 pc. sushi combo: $ 12.95; Contained yellowtail, salmon, shrimp, snapper, tuna, octopus, plus a CA roll. Appearance was fine and pieces were on the large size. Texture was just OK, but flavor was lacking, so I’m guessing they used cheaper cuts. (The yellowtail was not the least bit buttery) The CA roll was of the «crab salad» style and had far too much mayo. Disappointing.
– Bento lunch with Saba and CA roll: $ 8.50. A good price but the portion was much too small. Saba was overcooked and on the dry side (how do you overcook such an oily fish?). It also lacked crispiness along the edges. CA roll was similar to the style I had before but on a smaller scale. I was still hungry when I finished, so I ordered unagi nigiri to satisfy my stomach, which brought my lunch well out of bargain territory.
Sakura currently has a rating of 3 stars on Unilocal.In my opinion, it’s really a 2.5 star place, so I’ll adjust my rating down a bit.