Samurai Blue Sushi and Sake Bar

Really guys? We are long time customers and get take out from here frequently. But sometimes it’s totally hit or miss. Like this… This is 4 orders or salmon, 2 orders tuna, and 1 order of yellowtail sashimi. What kind of piece of tuna sashimi is this??? A real sushi chef would die!

We stopped going here about two years ago as the portions are very small, the prices are high, and the service is painful. The food is good though with decent atmosphere. Not worth repeating anymore unfortunately. I prefer Sushi Alive or Pacific Thai.

I like going to the Ybor location for sushi but this place is not a bad alternative if you’re in the Westchase area. Not usually very busy when I visit but gets the usual dinner rush.
The sashimi we had the last time we were he was pretty good. Fairly decent cuts. As for the rolls, the spontaneous combustion and the summer of love were pretty popular with the group.
Service here was pretty good. The server made sure to check up on us and refilled drinks in good time. Overall a nice place to grab some sushi and drinks.

EVERYTHING IS HOT! like SPICY HOT!
Ended up here after dance practice on a Saturday night. It was not as packed as I would expect a sushi restaurant to be on a Saturday night We were seated quickly in a big comfy booth.
The waiter was so nice and constantly checked on us to make sure we had everything we needed. He had many suggestions on what to order and what was good.
We ordered lots of food: Edamame is always safe and easy, tried the blue crab rangoon but it tasted more like rangoon mostly cream cheese. I got the Hiashi Special and it said spicy dressing but when it comes out the whole platter is in this soy sauce style bowl and everything was completely covered. It was good except that I lost my taste buds quickly as it was that burning hot spicy coz I’m not very a lover of too much spicy. So just beware or if you love spicy you’ll love it. Some other people at the table got a couple of rolls and they were also quite spicy. Overall, nothing really to make them stand out from the other sushi restaurants. I do feel bad that they’re about to open a huge sushi alive right next door though.
I’ll definitely be back but i’ll make sure to triple read the menu and just say not spicy to cover all my bases.

I agree with the past reviews; you can do better elsewhere.
The table we sat at was not clean. The Tampa rolls we ordered had no crunch to them and had too much mayo, giving them a sloppy texture. We pointed this out to the server, who essentially said that they prepare them with a light batter. It was difficult to discern batter on the fish when we dissected a roll — it might have been skin — but in any case, it was soft; certainly not like the tempura veggies and shrimp we had.
The tempura udon broth had no flavor of its own — and therefore neither did the noodles — but they sprinkled copious amounts of what I presume were chili flakes — which made the broth too spicy for my taste.
I was not impressed, and don’t think we will return. There’s too many other good sushi places in the area to bother with a substandard one.
On the positive side, the staff was polite and friendly, and the server offered to replace the sushi rolls or bring tempura chips, offers we appreciated but declined.

This place seemed pretty quiet for a Saturday night only a couple of tables full but that didn’t stop us from coming in. The staff was very friendly and accommodating as well as helpful when making suggestions. I ordered the beef tartar and it was very good chunky raw beef in a spicy sauce. I really like spicy food but man is the food here oh so very spicy!!! After a few bites my mouth was on fire and it wasn’t just the spicy dishes that were hot. Even some of the rolls that weren’t labeled as spicy were unbearably spicy. The sake helped cool the palette and the tempura was a refreshing crisp change from sushi. The rolls here were very good fresh tasting and creative. I would definitely come back again to try some more food but maybe I’d ask them to cut back on the spice just a bit to protect my pallets.

Delicious Philly roll made from fresh salmon instead of smoked. Seaweed salad was also good. Service was fine. Restaurant is comfortable, a little on the modern size, I like a little more Japanese flair, but the sushi is good. I’d go back.

Been passing this place every time I go to get some coffee. And this was the first time trying it out with some friends after a dance performance. The place was clean. The server was nice knowledgeable of what they have. Prize was not that bad for some good sushi and shumai. Service was fast and server made time effort to check on us if everything is well and if we need anything. Nice place to just chill and grab some sushi if your craving for some.
Suggestion if you like some spicy sushi try their emperor sushi my friend ordered it and it’s was spicy good.

I’m glad this SamuraiBlue location is here. I used to frequent the Ybor location before moving to the westchase area in 2012 and realizing there was one in my back yard. I’ve never had to wait to be seated here. It’s a bigger, more comfortable restaurant. You don’t have to get all snazzy to come to this one, but you can because it still gives off that upscale vibe that sushi places usually have. It is sort of hidden in the corner, so I can see why it can easily get missed.
You get the same specialty rolls here as Ybor including the famous volcano roll (everyone else uses crab delight… Samurai uses warm conch meat)! The blue moon and the samurai rolls are a fave.
I get take out from here a lot. I hope it sticks around and keeps up the quality. Westchase for whatever reason lacks good eats so we need this goodness in the area.

Every time I come to this establishment I can always expect great, cleanliness and friendly service. The sushi is on point along with other variety dishes on their menu.

This place is ok if you live in Westchase and are dying for sushi. Otherwise it’s worth the drive to go to the ybor location!

I love the sushi from here! I typically get a warm bagel roll and it is absolutely to die for. The reason for only giving 4 stars is that the place is pretty pricey. I haven’t found a way to get out of there spending less than $ 20/​person which includes a cocktail. I also like to have the flexibilty to get takeout from places I love, however, for some reason, the sushi from here doesn’t taste near as good when getting a to-​go order. So when I’m looking for a good sushi meal, not caring about price, and I have time to get out for a sit down meal, Samurai Blue is my go to place.

The sushi isn’t terrible, but there are much better options in the area. To be frank, I would pick up some sushi from Publix for $ 8 or $ 10 before going back here, I’d probably only go back if friends insisted.
I pretty much always order an eel roll and a specialty roll when I go to sushi places. The eel roll… it was pretty bad. The eel was paper thin. There was actually no eel in most of the pieces. I didn’t know it was possible for eel to be so thin, so I guess that’s an accomplishment? I reported it to our waiter, and showed him the pieces that physically had no eel in them and his answer was «Oh, they use two pieces of eel.» The other roll I had was the tempura lobster roll, it was all right.
Before our rolls, we had the tori yakitori which was very, very good. Tasted fresh and delicious, I would highly recommend it. I would say it is the only part of my meal I really enjoyed.
My husband had a lemon sake cooler, which he said was okay. He also had some hot sake, which he said was terrible. I am not a sake person but my husband always makes me try his, and even I could tell there was something very off about the flavor. Maybe it was stored or heated improperly, but there wast just something wrong with it.
Overall, I do not recommend this place. The service is just okay and the food is below average. Not exaggerating when I say that you should just pick up some sushi & a bottle of sake at Publix before considering Samurai Blue… or even better, head over to Zen Bistro which is nearby.

This place is Awesome !!
Great Sushi and service !
My wife and i go here for all our special occasions!
Try the Tuna Tataki !
It makes my mouth water just thinking about it!
Check out my pics.
I may sound like a commercial but NO i don’t work there. Ha

This is our favorite sushi in the area. I’m not an expert or anything on the topic of raw fish but I know we like this stylish and tasty spot. They take care to make the simple sushi properly, with the stripes of fat viable in the rolls.
Perhaps it’s because they hosted a Unilocal event some years back in their Ybor location. Either way, we love it and will return again and again!

This is the third sushi place we went to in a row during one weekend and it was the best by far.
My mother, who is Japanese (but third generation American so I’m not sure how much this counts), absolutely loved this place. We called her trip the weekend of sushi, because I chose sushi places for almost every meal. This was the third one we went to, for dinner on Saturday, and was by far the best.
We started with the Seafood Ceviche and it had a great amount of seafood and the ceviche sauce was delicious. My mom got the lychee martini. She was sad they no longer serve the alcoholic green tea drink, because they don’t have green tea vodka, but she said the lychee martini was delicious.
We then got the Hawaiian Roll and the Spontaneous Combustion Roll. The Hawaiian Roll was absolutely delicious. The coconut shrimp was fried to perfection. The Spontaneous Combustion Roll is very different from your normal roll, but it was a welcome difference and was very good. At 6 p.m. on a Saturday night only the booth tables were full and when we left around 7 p.m. there were even less people.
If you live in the area, do yourself a favor and eat here!

Womp womp womppppp! What a disappointment. We have lived in the area for years and would dine at SB a lot when they first opened. The place used to be busy and have good service. Sadly to say that is no longer the case. The food/​service is not proportionate to the price tag. We brought friends who had never dined there and they commented how how the vibe in the restaurant was «weird!» They were right it was. The hostess was cold and unsociable. Every request we had seemed to not be able to be met. Customer satisfaction has really gotten lost here.
Our server was ok. She was nice enough and took care of our table. The food was ok with the exception of the crab Rangoon. Which was AMAZING! I’m honestly surprised that this restaurant is still in business though. The cool atmosphere and warm temperature of the restaurant doesn’t make one want to come back. I don’t want to eat sushi in a hot restaurant, due to thoughts of the fish getting over heated.
I would rather take the drive over to Ybor for a better atmosphere and experience. With sushi restaurants being a dime a dozen these days do yourself and your wallet a favor and go somewhere else. Or take your food to go. We will not be back!
I am only giving this place 2 stars because of the taste of their food. If I was reviewing on service alone it would be one star if not zero.

Went here via recommendation. There are two locations of Samurai Blue (both have the same menus) and I was very fortunate that this location is relatively close by and didn’t have to deal with parking in ybor :).
To test the waters out, I got: a la carte salmon sashimi (to test the freshness & quality), a uni and scallop handroll (to test the freshness & bizarre lol), and the ever popular blue moon roll (to test a roll).
The a la carte salmon sashimi consisted of 3 long slices of the fish, and wow it really «melted in your mouth». It was fresh and does not have a the fishy odor. Wished I ordered more!
Then came the uni and scallop handroll. and wow I was surprised at how fresh the uni was! It has its brainy texture and it wasn’t mush. The handroll was literally the size of my hand (it was huge!) and consisted of two urchins, ~3 scallops and majority rice. I personally didn’t like how the flavors of uni and scallop were together, but if you are a sea urchin lover who wants to try new things incorporating urchin then here’s your thing!
Another fun fact about samurai blue is that they have a uni and ikura donburi (box)! Its basically uni and ikura over a bed of rice. This is the first time in tampa I have seen this (other than aki in orlando). The con about it compared to aki is that its double the price $$$$.
Finally the blue moon roll… I’ve heard so many good things about you… like how you could be someone’s last meal on earth. But sadly, you didn’t amaze me, and made me sad. The blue moon roll consisted of cream cheese, lump of blue crab, a ton of rice, asparagus, that’s battered in tempura and finally drenched in sauce. It came with 10 pieces. Why I didn’t like was because it was too sweet! Ok, that would be wrong of me to say that since I love sweets, and have a HUGE sweet tooth, but sushi-​wise, this is way too sweet! The flavor was like eating a plain bagel with cream cheese; with the sauce, it tasted like I was basically eating a spotted banana. I was on the struggle bus trying to eat all of the roll since I didn’t want to waste money on this expensive roll x_​x.
I don’t know if I would go back… although I do agree the sashimi and the quality of the fish was superb, it is a wallet killer! Yes, I know that sushi is quite expensive as it is, but I found many places that I could pay the same amount here but get twice the amount of food at a very high quality level (look at my sushi list). Another thing is that most of the rolls consists of imitation krab/​drenched in sauces; if you are willing to eat sushi, best eat sushi as how it should be with real seafood, not krab, and the flavor not concealed by a sauce. That’s all.

Decent sushi in the westchase area, but I wouldn’t travel far just to come here.
This location seems like the redheaded stepchild of the ybor location-​lacking character, unpolished servers who do not seem too happy when you walk in the door, and slow service.
I’ve tried to like this place, but I feel there are better options in the area.

We had some really great sushi here last night. Previous visits have been fine, but nothing really stood out, but the sushi chef was on the ball last night. Whoever that guy was, they need to make sure he’s there every night as far as I’m concerned. CRAB DELIGHT, SEAWEED SALAD ROLL and the PHILLY ROLL were all fantastic. Some of the best I’ve had, actually.
La Chica also ordered the Beef Yukkee, and the flavor was outstanding. Spicy, but very good.
I’d up my rating to a 3.5 if possible, and I cannot commit to a 4, so I’m leaving it a 3. But trust me, they impressed me last night.