Evidently Katsuya has been very busy expanding over the past several years. With the most recent outpost Downtown at LA Live and employing famous designer Philip Stark to design some of the interiors. The restaurant in Hollywood is probably the most well known – especially to paparazzi and celebrities (see Crazy for Katsuya) so they must be doing something right! Either that or these celebrities don’t know their sushi! Maybe they are over extended? Or maybe they are not so concerned with their original restaurant out in “the Valley”? Afterall, their marketing website doesn’t even mention their original restaurant in Studio City! We don’t understand what happened…all we know is this has definitively been the most disappointing Sushi Club since we started doing Sushi Club!
Several of us had even been here before, with much fonder memories of this being a premier sushi destination. But after this month’s visit we aren’t sure if we will ever go back! We contemplated making a “Best of…” section on this site, but I am almost thinking it would be interesting to also have a “Worst of…” with this restaurant being the first on that list! Maybe the winner of the most over-rated category! Some reviewers even thought we should only give Katsuya a 1.5 rating out of 5! The food was nothing special and the portions were super small and nothing had much flavor at all. Presentations did not entice you to look twice. We almost forgot to take photos because we were so uninspired (or maybe it was because Ruth wasn’t there who is always very militant about us documenting every dish???) Katsuya has a good reputation for having some very creative sushi but we did not see what the hype was about!
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What We Ordered
- Crispy Rice (rice was burnt and not crispy!)
- Seared Spicy Albacore with Crispy Onions (black and oily!)
- Spinach Salad with Sauteed Garlic Tuna (tasted like chicken)
- Lobster Dynamite Roll
- Sunset Roll
- Robert Roll
- Rainbow Roll
- BSC Roll (best of the worst)
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Our Favorites
BSC Roll
Nothing to actually write home about but probably the best of the dishes we ordered this evening.
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Sushi Gallery
(click image to zoom)
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- Spinich Salad w/ Sauteed Garlic Tuna
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- BSC Roll
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- Rainbow Roll
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- Lobster Dynamite Roll
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- Sunset Roll
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- Seared Spicy Albacore with “Crispy” Onions
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- Robert Roll
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- Crispy Rice
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- Menu Board
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- The Ladies
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- The Men
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- From the Parking Lot
Points of Interest
Very Poor Service!
After being seated it took over 10 minutes for the server to come. When she did come and take our food order, she never asked to take our drink order! We were served the first 3 dishes before we were even able to request our drinks. We only had 1 tiny communal dish of wasabi and ginger for the table. Needless to say, we ran out and had to wait a bit for more to be brought out. The poor service definitely lead us to not end up ordering as much food to try.
Loud and Crowded
Maybe not the best place to go on a date where you actually want to hear each other talk! We were crammed in like sardines. We didn’t even have a large group this month – just 5 of us – and we couldn’t even hear each other at our small table.
Celebrity Sighting!
Nothing major, but we did recognize an actor from General Hospital. We will have to fill you in later who he was. Sounds like we needed to go to the Hollywood restaurant to do the star sightings!
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Summary
Date: July 29, 2009
Restaurant: Katsuya in Studio City
Desserts: none.
In Attendance: All Founding Members (except for Ruth) plus special guests: Katrina!
Price: $$ - Meal cost was $27 pp. (with ~15% tip)
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