Halfway down the Danube

Kyoto

KYOTO
Calea Dorobantilor 79 A
Tel: 610 79 50 / 0723 695 825
Open: 12:00 - 15:00, 18:00 - 24:00.

Another attempt to create an authentic Japanese restaurant in Bucharest, and given the quality of the food, this place looks like succeeding. Not cheap, but the excellent fare is well worth the cost.
In Your Pocket Guide Bucharest

We went to the Kyoto for our Valentine's dinner -- I'm a sushi lover and I wanted to see whether it was as good as people said.

And, yes, it was.

We were timid, so we ordered only a California roll and a salmon/avocado roll for sushi. Boy, it was good! "Very decent sushi," even Doug conceded and he's not easy to please sushi-wise. Having lived on a Pacific island with Japanese tourists being the main import, one does get spoilt.

Anyway, the rolls are highly recommended but as the City Guide said, it's expensive. The California roll cost 200,000 ROL which is about 5 Euros or 6 US Dollars. The salmon/avocado roll cost even more at 214,000 ROL which is roughly 5,40/6,30. However, the rice was just the right amount and nicely flavored and it had the typical sheen good sushi rice is supposed to have. The sushi was well put together and the fish was fresh.

Since I liked the rolls so much, I got daring and ordered an Unagi (eel) sushi. It was good but I like my unagi crispy which this wasn't. That's entirely my fault. I like the unagi from "Sushi Sushi" (in Bethesda, MD) best and just shouldn't order it anywhere else, ever. The toro and the salmon sushi from the next table over looked very good, though.

We also had miso soup which was quite good -- can't do much wrong with miso soup. It came with seaweed and beef strips on the side which was

My main course was grilled salmon which was delectable. Finger-licking yummy. Doug had some excellent eggplant nangaku, which is cooked baby eggplant slices with miso. The only disappointment here was that it wasn't nearly enough. About four slices of half an eggplant won't fill you up. Good thing we had the sushi as well!

Service was good and friendly, albeit a bit timid. None of the dishes came with any rice, we had to order that separately. That might have been an oversight on our side. However, we also had to ask for wasabe for the sushi and that should not have been necessary in my eyes.

The interior is unspectacular: generic Japanese prints, rather bare white walls.. Complimentary green tea and hot towels are a nice touch.

So, yes, it's pricey. Our entire check ran about $50, and that was without wine or dessert.

But we plan to be back because the food is great. Maybe for the lunch menu which has sushi more in our price range.

Posted by claudia at February 16, 2004 06:33 PM