YO! Sushi, Meadowhall
I'M not entirely sure whether I am doing a restaurant review or sitting at the controls of the Starship Enterprise. But if you like gadgets and sushi then Meadowhall could be the place to be.
Here we are perched at the bar of the latest opening by YO! Sushi, the Japanese-style food chain. It's taken its time getting to the fourth largest city in England (opening in smaller Brighton, Nottingham and Reading first) and consequently others have materialised earlier.
Sushi is no longer a novelty after WasabiSabi, Sakushi and Yama Sushi, all well established in Sheffield. Nor is the kaiten, or conveyor belt, which does a big lazy loop at the bar outside House of Fraser in Meadowhall's Upper Mall. Sakushi did that first.
But they can't beat YO! Sushi for gadgets. I press this button and I get free still water. Press another and it's fizzy. Press a third and a waitress comes to see what you want.
Then, fitted into slots on the bar, is a container for the pink pickled
ginger I am finding so addictive, another for the soy sauce and a third for the not so hot as you might expect green wasabi mustard.
Then there are the stack of wooden chopsticks and, of course, the paper
napkins.
In front of us the dishes trundle round on the belt, all under clear plastic domes on different coloured plates. Lime are the cheapest at 1.70 then they rise by 50p degrees to pink at 3.70 and hit green at a fiver.
Inside the belt there's a troupe of chefs in black chopping away.
It all makes for food theatre and I've not yet rumbled that YO! Sushi will charge me 1.25 for a slightly dull mug of green tea when a conventional sushi restaurant will charge 1 and top up for free until you put down your chopsticks.
To our left the bar stools are replaced by tables for groups or families but we feel trendy perched by the belt.
We start with low-priced dishes, avocado and Japanese mayonnaise inside rice wrapped with seaweed, and tamago, a rectangle of sweet omelette balanced on more cylinders of rice.
We spend a bit more on prawn katsu, deep-fried prawns in Japanese beadcrumbs with a gooey fruit sauce.
So far, OK, but we're not that impressed by the flavours and textures. They don't really grab you.
In fact, we're not that impressed by what we see on the belt. There do seem to be an awful lot of edamame beans and, as our name is not Posh Spice, we don't much care for them.
There is not a lot in the way of sashimi (raw fish) which is one of the things YO! Sushi is all about. Best they can offer us, the only thing actually, is salmon. There was a problem with the fish supplier so there is no tuna.
That probably accounts for why I can't find any eel. We do discover some spicy pepper squid and it's not bad.
By now my wife is getting bored with the belt and I can't say I blame her. It's nearly but not quite beans, beans, beans.
A fair bit of the menu has to be ordered specially so we push the buzzer and a waitress beams down to the flightdeck of the starship Enterprise, er, our bar stools.
We order duck gyoza which are rather weedy looking dumplings, spicy pepper squid which is a lot better and vegetable firecracker rice, plenty of rice pepped up with chilli. A fat lass further along swipes my crab and avocado hand roll, decides it's not hers, and the staff want to give it to me! No chance.
None of this gets Mrs Food and Drink's juices going. She says she's still bored.
We have pumpkin karroke, breadcrumbed croquettes in a fruit sauce, which are fun and YO! Roll, salmon, avocado and fish roe, the chain's signature dish, which is pleasant but unremarkable.
Finally I get my crab roll, watery crab enclosed by a cornet of damp nori seaweed which has been ineptly assembled and tastes bland.
YO! Sushi is OK for a spot of fun but don't expect bright vivid flavours and tempting textures. They're on London Road.
Eleven plates of different colours, the green tea and a small bottle of Asahi beer (3.35) came in at 39.30.
YO! SUSHI
Upper Mall, Meadowhall.
Telephone: 0114 218 9722.
Open Mon-Fri 10am-9pm, Sat 9am-7pm, Sun 11am-5pm. Credit cards. Acres of parking.
My star ratings (out of five):
Food HHH
Atmosphere HHHH
Service HHH
Value HHH
Theme restaurant. Do not compare ratings between places of different style or price.
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Saturday 26 May 2012
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