Zen Sushi Won't Provide Zen

I've been eyeing the new sushi place that just opened on High Street for awhile, which was called "Zen Sushi + More". Then I saw that there's a rotating belt inside the store and I've never ever eaten in a sushi place that had rotating belt, so I was happy when it finally opened so I could give it a try. First of all, a little lesson for those of you who were less familiar with Japanese food. When a Japanese restaurant has a rotating belt, this means the restaurant serves "fast food" grade Japanese food. So my expectations weren't that high when I first went in, I was just excited to see the rotating belt because I have the attention span of a 5-year-old, and the rotating belt was just constant excitement. The restaurant had a nice atmosphere and nice selection of seats, which is unusual for a fast food Japanese restaurant. Anyways, on with the food.

I ordered Chasoba (tea infused cold noodle) and an order of hamachi (yellowtail) sashimi. My boyfriend got some grilled steak and chicken skewers and some sushi. When my hamachi sashimi arrived, the color was dark red with slight hint of pink. For people who don't know yellowtail, it is supposed to be a pale pink color. So that was a bad indication of the fish quality. Not only did the sashimi look bad, it tasted fishy too! I knew that it's supposed to be "fast food" grade Japanese food there, but the fish there was just terrible! My cold noodle was tough and gummy, when it was supposed to be soft and slippery with a little hint of Japanese green tea flavor. Needless to say, I wasn't very happy about it. The grilled steak and chicken skewers were ok, but then again, it's pretty difficult to mess up grilled skewer food. The marinade flavor for the steak was peppery and the chicken was teriyaki-ish. But the steak was grilled to well done and was a bit tough. Their sushi flavor was weird and wasn't what I was expected at all. The food there was pretty crappy, and at the end when the restaurant owner came over and asked how our dinner went, I told him honestly that the sashimi fish that they got was in lower grade. And his answer was "but I got those from the Japanese fish market", like that's gonna help! So I just dropped it and decided to spread the word about Zen Sushi + More.

The restaurant atmosphere was nice, but the food was crappy. I would rank it a 2 out of 5 on my yummy scale. If you were looking for sushi that's represented by false advertising, please try Zen Sushi + More right next to the Hampton Inn on 501 North High Street, Columbus OH 43215.