On A Roll

So I’m not trying to throw shade, but this is one of the worst restaurants in Tucson. I was here not long ago and it was so bad, you could never convince me to try it again.
I ordered a few rolls and none of them were good. They rolls were sloppy. And worse than that, the rice was crunchy?! How does that even happen? It was like eating gas station sushi.
The only nice thing I have to say about this place is that our server was so great. The young gal was so attentive and so sweet that we left a great tip because she almost salvaged the experience.
Do yourself a favor and skip this place.

OAR is so creative with their sushi menu. I just love coming here for sushi however, it can get pricy:(my husband and I order like crazy. We just can’t get enough of On a A Roll Sushi! Try the Spicy Surfer. You won’t be sorry you tried it. Ps this place in better than RA. Yes, I said it.

Gonna miss this place come July 3^rd am sadden that they are closing their doors! In my humble opinion of the best places in Tucson for sushi. I visited other sushi places but they pale in comparison to On a Roll. I wish the owner the best on there new ventures…

Fantastic! Service is great, all the servers and chefs are more than eager to answer any questions you might have about the fish your eating. The fish itself is very savory and high quality.
The are few inland sushi restaurants that get my stamp of approval, this is one of them.

This is our downtown sushi spot! We always get the spicy tuna poppers. Still trying out different sushi rolls.

UPDATE (July 1, 2015): They’ve CLOSED :-/​
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Their specialty rolls ARE out of this world but the rest of the experience is about average (ie, for a typically higher-​end food genre, such as sushi).
I have been here about a half-​dozen times, both day and night. Lunch hour and weekday evenings are busy but never packed. There are both tables (2 & 4 tops dominate, but they can accomodate up to 10) and a bar with plenty of solo seating for diners. Fri and Sat after 6:30p can get packed and, without reservations, wait times will be very long. Unfortunately, as so many Unilocalers have identified, along with that comes long wait times for food. There are several flat-​screen TVs above the bar (and visible to all diners too) and they are tuned to a variety of sports/​ESPN channels.
One of our favorite dishes here (and among our favorites at any seafood establishment in Tucson) is their grilled teriyaki salmon entrée $ 19 (a terrific infusion of flavor, along with sides that include exotic/​sliced veggies and rice). The other big favorite are their terrific specialty sushi rolls. Secret: there are some that are not always «on the menu» but are worth asking about and often the chefs will still make these even though they aren’t THAT evening’s specials. Finally, unlike most sushi places, they do have one non-​boring dessert, but it is designed for two people. To call it a «banana sunday» is an unfair simplification, because it is unique, rich and delicious.
Besides the sometimes slow service (something that should have been addressed with now-​predictable ebb/​flow peak crowd times) the only other critique would be on the prices. The rolls typically run about $ 15 for the most sophisticated ones, where it wouldn’t be uncommon to find similar rolls for closer to $ 10 – 12 at other establishments around town. The downtown atmosphere (and rent) may have something to do with that. But off-​setting these prices is On-​A-​Rolls’ frequent discount offerings on Living Social;
and elsewhere.

Arrived early. Not too busy. Tables took more than normal time to turn over. We were told that the wait was 15min and took 30 mins.
After being seated, we placed orders for drinks and food. Of note, there was no clear descriptions on the drink menu… for example the «sophisticated lady» had no description of the contents. When asking the waitress, she did not know what was in the drink. As an experiment, we order this drink along with the cucumber — tini. Miso soup was complimentary which was positive. It was good and arrived in a timely manner. Unfortunately, 40 minutes later our drinks arrived!!! Our entrees came out and we told the server that we still haven’t received our drinks. Our entrees came before sushi or the drinks. On arrival, the cucumber –tini was strong and tasted like vodka. The «sophisticated lady» was anything but… it tasted like cranberry juice with soda water and some vodka. We never did not get an explanation of what was in the drink.
During our experience, the Waitress complained 3 times about the fact that she was busy without support despite the fact that the restaurant was half empty and that she was chatting at the bar with friends. This did not improve our dinner experience.
As for the sushi– we ordered classic rolls including: spicy tuna, caterpillar, shrimp tempura and California rolls. The Rolls were not well balanced. Avocado was overwhelming on the caterpillar rolls and the spicy tuna mix was not impressive. The shrimp tempura was bland. Other aspects of the sushi experience, the wasabi was not very spicy and the ginger was dry. The chicken entrée we ordered was super dry and barely eaten. Of note, we needed to ask for bowls for soy sauce and unfortunately they were out of the bowls and we received appetizer bowls for soy sauce. This is in the context of the restaurant being half empty.
At the completion of the evening, when asked about the food by the waitress, we responded that it was «okay.» She noted that this was, «Not good». There was no apology and no action taken. The «sophisticated lady» drink was not touched on the table and the waitress did not ask if we even liked it.
To say the least. We will never go back. Terrible service and the food was also very bad.

The dining experience was ok. My wife and I decided to sample numerous rolls. We had received a voucher from
. At our last outing to On A Roll the waitress had told us that happy hour prices do not count for the minimum amount spent, so to make sure next time to make sure that portion of the bill was used before we do any happy hour specials. So we had the Tucson Cowboy, the Sanchez, and the Caterpillar roll. Under our understanding this now satisfied the guidelines for the voucher. We also wanted to try some of their other rolls so we ordered from the happy hour menu. We got the spring rolls (tasted basically of onion), a Philadelphia Roll and the Chimichunga Roll. The rolls were decent. The best one was the Chimichunga Roll.
After we hit our stopping point our server brings the bill. All items were charged full price. According to the manager on duty (who was not pleasant and could not care any less about customer satisfaction) the items could not be sold at Happy Hour prices. I told him what our last server said ($ 35 has to be spent on regular price items). He did not care in the least. We had to mark our items on the menu. Our server never came and told us that these items would be charged at the full price. So our bill was about $ 12 – 15 more than we had expected it to be! Had the server told us this we would have changed our order.
Customer service is not a priority of the manager. My wife and I will NOT return to this establishment. There are way better sushi places to frequent then this one!
Oh– and we will be sure to tell our friends to pass also!

Dreadful service and food to match — the best I can say is avoid at all costs. It took 45 minutes to get an appetizer salad (tasteless) and their tempura was an oil-​saturated mess. The server laughed about how rotten the service was and said she hoped we had a better time elsewhere. I’ll be taking her advice.
The tuna salad appetizer was completely tasteless — either the fish nor the greens had any flavor, and the salad was dressed in a splash of rice vinegar. The tempura took nearly an hour, obviously because the kitchen had no sufficiently hot oil. Truly inedible.

I would give this place 5 stars for their food. Server Amy was incredible. Pricing was ridiculously high and seriously over priced for the small portions we received. Won’t be returning until pricing is assessed.

I just read my last review of this place. I was hoping things would have changed after the last few years but no. It’s still mediocre.

We went in with a Living Social coupon because I had really been wanting to check this place out and when it was advertised I figured why not? I am very glad I had that coupon though. Rolls here are about twice as much as anywhere else. That would be ok if the flavor was out of this world, sadly it wasn’t. While decent to good, there are much better sushi places in Tucson. They are inventive that is for sure and it we were anxious to try some of these unique rolls but when they did arrive they just had very little to no flavor. A roll that was advertised as having some kind of jalapeño sauce and warned to be ‘spicy’ couldn’t be differentiated from a Philly roll. What a let down. What really saved everything was our great server. She was busy but kept everything flowing and was very pleasant and patient with us even though it was taking forever for us to make up our minds ;) I could be talked into going back but it wouldn’t be my first choice.

Food was amazing, service was on point and sitting at the sushi bar watching them work was so great. New favorite spot! Manager brought out an extra dish just to give us something to try, we have a great time and will be back sooner rather than later!

The sushi here is great! Every weekend, around 6−12pm there is a great crowd and a great vibe. I love the sushi. I don’t think any other sushi place compares to the sushi here. Their specialty rolls knock out every other place in town! Also, it is downtown in a fun atmosphere. The service is great. Servers are always on point and very kind. The whole scene inside of on a roll is great and enjoyable. There is always good music playing and a DJ on Saturdays. I would suggest a look at the kitchen menu if you aren’t a fan of sushi. The Tucson Chicken is very good!!!
5 stars for you on a roll!

Cold miso (but complementary, sooooo that’s ok?)
No quail eggs — on a Saturday night
Not a Japanese person in sight
Fish below average
Rolls pretty average
Service sloppy
Loud DJ ‘spinning tunes’

OH MY GOODNESS. I really have never in my life been so tempted to walk out on a meal in my life. If you would like a play-​by-​play, one is supplied in the following paragraphs. If not, DINE ELSEWHERE unless the restaurant is completely empty.
The location of this place is fabulous and that’s why we chose to dine here despite the already lacking reviews. We arrived as a party of three on a Friday evening just after happy hour hoping to miss the crowd. It was busy, but it’s Friday so we were not surprised.
We were seated immediately which was excellent and thankfully there were menus on the table already. After making questioning eye contact with many staff members since we were not attended to in 25 minutes, our waitress finally came to us and asked if we knew what we wanted… She didn’t even bring us water yet or supply a drink menu!
Ten minutes later we get the drink menu and waters. 25 MORE minutes later she asks us what we want to drink… We place our entire order which she writes down verbatim. I ordered their version of a Margarita (without salt), one friend got their cucumber Martini and another just got a whiskey sprite. The waitress offered complimentary miso soup and we accepted.
Twenty sober minutes later the waitress brings our drinks. My on-​a-​roll Rita was an unexpected bright blue color and had a salt rim which I asked to be left off. It was a waste of money. My friend’s Cucumber Martini tasted like a child poured some liquid candy into the drink and garnished it with a Cucumber after pouring glow stick fluid into it. Disgusting.
After asking TWICE, our miso soups arrived and they were actually good for what they were. One guest ordered the crab puffs which weren’t terrible but we’re 90% cream cheese rather than crab. Not worth it.
Our sushi finally came. The three of us got the aloha roll, Las Vegas roll and the lollipop rolls. They honestly were all good. Every one of them was disappointing in some way such as under ripe fruit or difficultly in dealing with the way the dish was presented, but the rolls tasted decent and fresh. We never did receive the small dishes for soy sauce which was just another thing to be annoyed about.
After the almost two unenjoyable hours we spent here, we did eat decent food. But our waitress should consider a career change and the restaurant needs to get its shit together. This is sushi. It is raw! It shouldn’t take me two hours to get in and out. The service here was honestly the worst I’ve ever experienced and it made the OKAY food not even worth the struggle. The drinks are also so despicable that it was enraging.
I would never recommend this place to anyone for any reason. Tucson has plenty of sushi options with better service, better drinks and better food.

I came here with a few friends during happy hour and really enjoyed myself. There are a couple really good rolls on the happy hour menu, along with spring rolls and edamame. The spring rolls were the best part, however, my edamame was lukewarm and I thought it was steamed. Everyone received complementary miso soup which tasted like soy sauce in a bowl so I steered clear of that. The best part is that you can get one of those sappiro beers with a small sake (perfect for sake bombs) for about $ 7. It’s a great place to go and have decent sushi and some booze on a budget.

Me and hubby were in the area during a second saturday event and we were really craving sushi. It was pretty busy inside, I had ordered the Tootsie Roll which I thought was pretty damn yummy and hubby ordered two other dishes, cant remember what they were called but they really hit the spot. The prices were very reasonable, think it was like a happy hour. Atmosphere was clean. Service was ok, server forgot to give me my drink for some time. The wait for the food was a bit long, which irritated me a bit.
all in all if you want some decent sushi at a good price, this is a good place.

I like this place but only because of sentimental reasons that have to do with someone close to me that passed away that used to work here… With that said, everything below is said without bias:
The service is the WORST. We waited 45 minutes before even getting the waitress to take our order. Another 30 just to bring our drinks. Another hour just to request miso soup (the sushi hadnt even come out yet so we decided on soup after all while waiting FOREVER).
The sushi is flavorless and mediocre. The service is even worse. I dont know what else to write because I’ve chosen to delete the experience from my memory.

I’m in the hot desert, following my local friend’s suggestion. I was half unconscious from lack of sleep, mostly depleted from a long day of yoga and we were going to a sushi place in the desert?! Half way through, after we ordered and we were waiting for our rolls, I decided to check in, scope out what others had to say, and snapped the hell out of it, asking myself why the f*** am at a sushi place in downtown Tucson?!
Admiring the music selection (old school 70s & 80s hip hop) and the funky party décor, we started talking about how this place has had its ups and downs. According to my localite friend, he proclaimed there is only one good sushi chef there, he makes appearances during happy hour on Tuesdays and Thursdays… and I’m not sure the rest.
We ordered:
–Vegetable Tempura: 2 stars. some of the veggies weren’t cooked all the way :-(
–Octopus– 5 stars. my favorite! Shoulda opted for more of this from the get-​go!
California Roll– 3 stars– Descent tasting. Complete with imitation crab
.
Eel– barbecued. 5 stars, pal. Yum. Should’ve ordered more of this one too!
Squid– 0 stars. Yuck. I think I threw up in mouth. I quickly «chased’ the ick-​iness with chopstick loads of ginger and wasabi, hoping the taste would go away; while my dining buddy actually spit the squid out on to a pile on his plate. Double YUCK!
So, Vegetable tempura and squid to the side, the food was not half bad. The wait staff was sweet, attentive and on it, time wise, from beginning to end. The restaurant atmosphere and staff were lively and parking on the street during happy hour was a cinch.