Sapporo Sushi

Sapporo Sushi
330 Highway 7 E Unit 109

If you want to talk about going out of ones “comfort zone” today’s trip north pretty much sums it up for me! All my plans to visit a sushi restaurant recommended by my photography instructor were thrown out the window when the AC unit at work blew up. Guess who had to go into work to get it repaired? Me. So instead of heading to Yonge and Finch, I wound up detouring to Highway 7 and Bayview with my friend Jolie.

Apparently Sapporo Sushi is known for both it’s lunch specials and it’s Spicy Tuna Temaki. Strangely enough neither of us ordered either of them! But as I wasn’t really in the mood for Temaki, I did order thier Spicy Tuna Roll ($4.50) and I couldn’t resist the idea of the 88 Roll ($8.88). Jolie grabbed a Bulgogi Roll that just screamed “wrong!” to me, but realistically no sort of roll can be wrong, just tuned for different palates.

Before I get into the nitty gritty of the 88 roll, I must digress a bit. Once upon a time I dated a woman of Cantonese descent who explained Chinese numerology to me. Luckily wikipedia has an article about it which goes into interesting detail, but suffice it to say the number eight stands for good fortune. So an 88 roll which costs $8.88 hopefully will bring you fortune after you eat it. No more silly than astrology or “lucky number 7″ to me, so how could I resist it? But essentially the 88 roll was a California roll wrapped with Salmon and a razor thin slice of lemon. I’ve gotten to the point where California rolls bore me a bit, but attempts to “spice” them up are always welcome. This time, the lemon really brought out the flavour of the salmon as I’m used to tasting it. You always have fish with lemon, or at least I always have. The lemon did get a little overwhelming after a bit, so I tried a couple of pieces without it. It wasn’t the same, the lemon added a real kick that worked well.

The spicy tuna was also quite good, but a tad on the “too spicy” side. They did do it in my favorite way, where the tuna was blended with spices and a bit of tempura for a nice crunch, but it was spicy enough that I did sweat a little bit. Luckily I had the 88 roll and both rolls complemented each other well. One bite of one, one of the other, and nothing got too much. Still, I would have enjoyed it more had the spice been dialed down a notch.

Overall, while I have no idea when I’ll ever be around Hwy 7 and Bayview again, Sapporo is worth checking out. The restaurant itself is a bit small, but the value for the money is excellent. Fat, generous rolls at a very reasonable price.