Sushi, Plastic and Water

The last weekend of January was a touring disaster, the highlight of the weekend was a trip to the supermarket to stock up on all my new low / no fat food items that I've been forced to eat due to an excessively high cholesterol level. Life has a funny way of reining us in, just as we think we have it all sorted. But hy ho enough about that.  This weekend was definitely an improvement on the tourist front. We were a little pushed for time and had a family commitment on Sunday, so the Sunday tourist became the Saturday Tourist.

After consulting my WiningAndDining specials email, very useful little email I might add, we decided on Sushi from Taiwan City - Chinese Cuisine at Canal Walk. We live relatively close to Canal Walk, and sushi is wonderfully low in fat, so it seemed like the perfect choice.

The restaurant is situated on the upper level of Canal Walk, it has an outdoor area, right next to the fountain court, which is like a magnet for kids who want to play in the water. The management of Canal Walk would do well to alter the design of the fountains area to make it child friendly. During our visit we saw 3 separate incidents of kids falling flat on their backs after slipping on the tiles. Come on Canal Walk, it wouldn't cost a huge amount to put some non slip paving down and remodel the area with water play equipment, in winter the fountains could be switched off leaving just the play equipment. All the restaurants have outdoor seating, and there were numerous families at the outside tables, I'm sure its just meant to look pretty, but -  water / children "in particular spraying water" It's a match made in heaven. We even saw one blissfully happy little girl wade in with a bucket and spade in tow. Mommy and Daddy actually got to enjoy an uninterrupted lunch, bonus!


But I digress, back to Taiwan City. We had booked a table, which proved to be a bit pointless as we were the only people there, by the way this was 12 o'clock on Saturday. We were shown to our outside table and left with the menus. I opted for the Sushi Platter "R99.00 for 20 pieces Sushi Combo" and my hubby decided on the set menu R75, two starters, two main courses and fried rice, dessert. A waitress arrived with a bowl and side plate and a very well used set of chop sticks for each of us. I was a little taken aback to see the bowl was plastic, as was the plate, very tacky. But we were hoping the food would make up for the lack of finesse.

We waited about 10min for my husbands first course to arrive, "in another plastic bowl, with plastic soup spoon" - bizarre! It was a traditional Chinese chicken soup with noodles and egg. My hubby fell in love with it, to quote him it was "divine" My Sushi arrived at the same time as my hubby's main course which was chicken noodles and deep fried beef strips, served with egg rice, again he was very impressed with the taste and the size of the portion. As he demolished his plate "this one wasn't plastic" we did have to giggle when we noticed the logo and name of another Taiwanese restaurant revealed on the middle of the plate. Must of been a closing down sale...

My sushi was in a word, "disappointing", the best item was the sashimi but even that was badly cut. There was little to no presentation. I did have an oblong plate of sorts, but it had seen better days. The rice didn't hold together at all and the seaweed was chewy. I was also annoyed that the only soy sauce provided, was the red capped Kikkoman, I was told by our waitress they didn't have the  lower salt green cap option. I landed up giving 8 of my 20 pieces to my hubby who agreed it was far from the best we have eaten. Of the remaining 12 I only managed 8, I can normally whiz through 20 pieces so this was a first for me.

My hubby's set menu was completed with a choice of, you guessed it, bow ties or ice cream. He choose the ice cream, which was just that, a spoon of shop bought, vanilla ice cream plonked it yet another plastic bowl with a teaspoon, oh dear! I drank more wine and watched as yet another child was lured in by the fountains.

Ice Cream done, "my hubby actually managed 2 teaspoons" We called for the bill, which came to just over R260. My opinion of Taiwan City, well as far as traditional Chinese food goes, they make a tasty honest meal. I would suggest they stick to this and leave the sushi to the experts. But the plastic bowls, second hand plates and tacky chopsticks, they are just unforgivable, one could expect this from an out of town Chinese restaurant but a restaurant in Canal Walk... ah no, unacceptable. 


Would I go back? No, would I recommend it, No. Sorry, I love sushi way too much for a repeat visit.