Tuesday 20 February 2024

Sushi Train - Underwood


Long before there was Sushi Edo and Ichiban Sushi, there was Sushi Train. Looking back on my childhood, I had fond memories of waiting for their anniversary sales where all plates would be $3 or $3.50 and we would queue up and eat to our heart's content. Perhaps I haven't been paying attention for sometime, but I was thrilled when I saw that they were having a $3.50 sale for the grand opening of their new Underwood store, so we trekked out there to line up half an hour before opening. We arrived to see a small group of people gathering at the door and we seated just before their scheduled opening time.


The setup was quite modern and the restaurant could accommodate quite a substantial amount of people. I had considered the kaiten sushis which had ipads to order dishes to be fairly modern, however this Sushi Train was even more modern with QR codes on the table to order from your personal device.



To their credit, they kept the train very well stocked and not just with the cheaper end of the menu, there was a good variety of fish and non fish options as well as cooked and non cooked dishes. As you would expect, we ended up getting a lot of food, so I will only provide brief commentary on each dish. 


First up was the aburi salmon, the fish was thick cut but a bit light on the caramelization. I also found the rice to have been a bit under seasoned, which is surprising when most sushi trains are fairly consistent.


Next up was the akami tuna, this was fresh and thick cut. Again (and in all other dishes) the rice was under seasoned. 


The tobiko ship was good, there was a generous amount of tobiko on top. Seaweed was fresh and crispy.

 

The salmon nigiri echoed the tuna nigiri, thick cut and fresh. I found the Salmon Tobiko ship to be fantastic value, especially for the sale price given there were two pieces per dish.


The salmon avocado ship was also delicious and creamy with the avo being just ripe enough.


This was our first serve of ikura salmon. There was confusion because it came as two pieces in a serve which caused us to order many more but it was in fact one serve per dish. There was however a generous amount of ikura but it would probably not be worth the standard price.


Probably my only regret that day was to order the salmon avo hand rolls. This was mainly because there was a huge amount of rice in the roll and I filled up more than two dishes of nigiri. Otherwise the avo and salmon were delicious but I would have liked the seaweed if it was more crispy.


This was the negi toro ship, it was fairly standard and there was a good amount of minced tuna in the dish.


The same can be said for the negi salmon dish. It was the first time trying it but I don't think it was memorable enough to order again.

 

I've always considered sushi train to have a fairly high standard of wagyu and Underwood was no different. The unagi roll was also well received.


One of our final salmon nigiris was the salmon avo nigiri. Ordinarily the avocado pieces are a bit bigger at other restaurants, otherwise it was fine.

 

Rounding off we had a serve of unagi nigiri which was very delicious and the unagi was fairly generous in size. The best dish of our meal came last, and was a thinly sliced wagyu nigiri topped with uni. Although it was only one piece per dish, the toppings on it may as well have been generous enough for two pieces. The wagyu was buttery soft and melt in your mouth while the uni was fresh and creamy. Definitely finished our meal on a highlight and I wish I could have had more of these.


Overall we had a fantastic time at Sushi Train Underwood. It definitely exceeded my expectations in terms of consistency and freshness, no doubt we will be back in the near future for more.

Price Range: $3.50 per plate (opening special)

Taste: 8.5/10
Value: 9/10
Service: 8/10
Environment: 8/10 

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