Futaba Sushi

Not a pic of Futaba sushi, but a pic from Wikipedia

We have been looking for a good source from which to order sushi here in Victoria and have had mixed results from different restaurants and often having an annoying problem with people finding our house.  We live on a moderately busy street that is not hard to find, our address can be seen clearly from the street but from some reason there has been regular problems getting the food to our house on time.

We have ordered from Futaba a couple of times and the last time they were also late but they not only reduced the price of the late sushi, the offered us a credit on our next order.  Last night we ordered from them again for Daniel's 16th birthday dinner and they made good on the credit and arrived on time.

My oldest son Daniel has been a fan of sushi since he was six years old and we ate at sushi restaurant on Commercial Drive in Vancouver.   Catherine and I were in Vancouver and met up for dinner with Daniel's name sake Daniel Gawthrop.   The restaurant was basically empty and while the three adults sat our table, Daniel sat an the counter and watched the sushi being made.   That seems to he the moment he fell in love with sushi and became a true west coaster.

Daniel has since learned how to make sushi and we always have a supply of sushi rice, nori and rice wine vinegar on hand.   His rolls are decent for flavour but he has trouble rolling them.

I am actually amazed at how many sushi restaurants there in Vancouver now.   Back when I was growing up in the Lower Mainland there were a few but not like one on every block.   Sushi seems to almost have become Vancouver's primary cuisine,  but I digress.

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Futaba has their whole menu available online and it is easy to read.   It is amazing how many restaurants do not have a good online menu especially ones offering take away food.   The one thing they could do to improve their online menu would be to have a picture link for each menu item, I knew what I ordered but when it came I was not 100% certain what was what.

I ordered 8 pieces of nigiri and and 10 rolls.   This, along with the gyoza we cooked at home, were more than enough for the six of us.   Thesushi came nicely arranged on a large tray and not in small styrofoam containers.   I was impressed with how it looked when it arrived because I could just put the tray out on the table.   They gave us a very generous portion of wasabi and pickled ginger.   I meant to ask the boys to save the extra after dinner, but I was not paying attention and it ended up in the garbage, 'ton pis'.

The nigri was salmon and shrimp, it was good but not excellent, the salmon was a bit thick for my liking.  I did not order a lot of it because it is something that I am the only one that really eats.  Certainly no one else touched the shrimp nigiri.  

I ordered beef teriyaki, California, tempura, dynamite and salmon skin rolls.   I meant to order some negitoro rolls as well, but I forgot.  They were all well formed and tight with decent flavour.  There is nothing I can say against them but on the other hand they were not so brilliant that I was stunned by their amazing nature.    If I were to raise an issue of complaint, and complaint is the wrong word, it is that I would have liked a little bit more vinegar in the sushi.  I think that is what it would have taken to move it from decent day to day to something extraordinary.

Futuba is very good value for money.   Having all this sushi delivered and handsomely displayed on the tray came to only $66 before tip.   We will be ordering from Futaba in future when we want sushi delivered.

Can I make sushi better at home?  No I can not, I can make sushi that is of the quality you buy in a super market but nothing like what I can get from a sushi restaurant.