We recently moved to the Columbus Circle/Lincoln Square area and are still exploring the vast culinary options available in this neighborhood. We’ve tried a few restaurants in Hells Kitchen and are always searching for good places to order in from. We’ve only had one takeout menu slipped under our door so far, however, and figured that we would give it a shot. According to the menu, Oyishi offers standard Japanese food and sushi but there are lots of choices and pre-set combination plates that appear to be great deals.
We selected Special Roll Combo F ($11.95), which included a spicy tuna roll, a salmon avocado roll and a house special roll (a “jumbo” roll with salmon, tuna, yellowtail, white tuna, red snapper, crunch and tobiko). It also came with a choice of soup or salad. Our next selection was the all day sushi roll special, which is a choice of any two rolls for $6.66 or any three rolls for $8.99 and also includes a choice of soup or salad. The list of rolls to choose from doesn’t include any “deluxe” options, but all standard rolls are available. We went with a tuna roll, yellowtail with scallion, and white tuna with cucumber. Lastly, we decided to try a hot item and ordered a chicken katsu kitchen platter that is served with rice and salad ($6.25).
The delivery came pretty quickly, arriving in approximately 30 minutes. We opted for miso soups with our roll combinations, and those arrived still hot, which is a definite plus.
Still hot miso soups
The chicken katsu was warm but the coating was no longer crunchy, something to be expected from delivered fried food. It had a nice peppery flavor but lost points for the prepackaged manufactured katsu sauce that came in foil packets. The accompanying salad was just iceberg, a single slice of cucumber, a single slice of tomato and, oddly, a wedge of lime. The dressing was standard ginger but they didn’t even give us enough to cover the small salad. Maybe I should have squeezed the lime wedge over the rest of the lettuce?
Chicken katsu with prepackaged katsu sauce and a side salad with ginger dressing.
The main event for us was the sushi. If there were just one food that Josh could eat for the rest of his life, it would be sushi. As such, he takes his fish pretty seriously and freshness is obviously a huge issue. Overall, the rolls were decent.
House special roll (top), spicy tuna roll (left), salmon avocado roll (right)
Yellowtail is my favorite fish and this version tasted pretty fresh. The scallion, usually just side note, was nicely crisp and brightened up the flavor of the roll. The tuna and salmon were a bit pale but tasted ok. Josh really didn’t like the white tuna, however, and found it to be too stringy.
White tuna cucumber roll (left), tuna roll (top), yellowtail scallion roll (bottom)
Our biggest complaint was that the soy sauce was too sweet – kind of an oxymoron. At first we thought the sushi rice had too much sugar but when we tasted each component individually, the sauce proved to be the culprit.
The verdict: meh. Not bad, and certainly not the worst sushi we’ve ever had, but that’s not exactly a ringing endorsement. It was just slightly better than average. The prices, however, were very reasonable, and in fact, it would be a great Midtown Lunch place if it weren’t just out of bounds on 46th St. between 8th and 9th Aves. There are lots of combo specials during lunch that are well under the $10 limit. For me and Josh, however, I think we’ll be checking out some other Japanese restaurants in our delivery range.
Oyishi
374 West 46th St. between 8th and 9th Ave.
New York, NY
Tags: Delivery, Japanese, Midtown West, Sushi