Haru Sushi… Worth a visit?

Eh.

Maybe for the atmosphere or bar scene. The food was not memorable though.

If you are in the mood for good sushi, there are many places out there to try… but this is not one of them. It’s not that the food is bad, it’s that there is nothing special about it. I have been blown away by some sushi in the past… so I was a little disappointed by Haru Sushi.

We had 7pm reservations and the place was PACKED when we got there. There is definitely a large bar scene and after work crowd. The restaurant has only been open about a month, so they are still going through there always busy honeymoon phase. The decor and overall ambiance of the place is great. I had very high hopes when we arrived; the place has a hip New York City feel to it, with funky high-base trance music playing in the back ground and lots of pretty people mulling around.

We were seated right away and our server was very attentive and friendly. We started out with the King Crab Dumplings ($8.50), which arrived quickly and were served with a spicy soy vinaigrette. The dumplings were quite good… a modern twist on the traditional crab Rangoon.

In order to get a feel for the quality of the sushi and see how Haru compared to the great sushi places we’ve been to, we decided to go simple and order the Sushi and Sashmi for Two ($58). Our dinner took a little longer to arrive, with our server apologizing for the delay.

There were eight pieces of sashimi — tuna, salmon, super white tuna and yellow tail (2 of each). The super white tuna was a new one for us… and VERY tasty. The rest of the sashmi was fresh and decent-sized. There were several pieces of sushi as well — 2 shrimp, 2 tuna, 2 salmon and 2 smoked eel. The shrimp was very tough, the rest of fish was fresh and also decent-sized. Lastly, the plate came with six California rolls, six tuna, avocado & caviar rolls and six crunchy salmon rolls. We didn’t feel like California rolls, so we asked if we could substitute them for the rock shrimp and avocado rolls… this was no problem. The rolls were so-so. We didn’t care for the rock shimp and avocado rolls. We weren’t sure if it was a specific seasoning, the seaweed or something else, but they almost had a ‘moldy’ aftertaste. The tuna and avocado were okay — nothing special and the crunchy salmon rolls weren’t crunchy. I expected tempura crumbs or something…

In fairness to Haru, there did appear to be some interesting “Special Rolls” on the menu, but we didn’t try any. You can click here to see a PDF version of the entire menu.

All in all… Date Night worthy? Sure… the atmosphere is good and the food’s not bad; however, if you are dying for some delicious sushi, I would recommend going to Fugakyu or Oishii instead. Will we go again? No… why bother? Village Sushi in Roslindale Village delivers and their sushi is ALWAYS awesome!