Sakana Grill

Been eating at Sakana since they opened, always love the tappanyaki and sushi. Usually start with a couple rolls and sushi, then the best of the best, tappanyaki. They cook your dish in front of you, it’s grilled to perfection. I always order the steak and shrimp, and just for the record, best shrimp ever! And you get veggies also, as for the rice, I pay extra and get egg fried rice. All served with 2 of the best sauces, the ginger (for seafood and veggies) and the steak sauce (for meats) but I use both for everything! I recommend this place for a great night out!

Great happy hour
(Honestly that’s all I can say)
I will never go for the regular price, but happy hour, you can’t beat their price !

The downtown location offers the option of having a chef cook right at your table, if you’re into that sort of thing-​great for groups, I might add. I’ve always sat in a booth away from the «entertainment» and enjoyed my food no less. The Love Boat Deluxe is a terrific value especially if you order it from the late-​night menu after 9PM; just don’t expect the actual wooden boat (these seem to be in short supply). On your way out, help yourself to one of the complimentary sweet treats, such as the chocolate mint patties.

Sure there are many sushi restaurants in Calgary but Sakana Grill is the full experience that you want to have when you go for sushi. The biggest menu, the friendliest staff, overall a very entertaining Japanese experience. If you go on your birthday they sing to you in Japanese, it is very cute!

Being a sushi lover, it is sad when there aren’t many sushi choices in downtown at reasonable prices. Sakana was one of the very first sushi restaurants I’ve ate at in my early teens — I’ve been eating there since they first opened! When I’m at work and need a quick fix, Sakana does the job. I know they’re not authentic nor do they have the best service, but my last few meals have been pretty satisfactory with fresh fish and decent hot items. Overall, decent with average prices and they will continue to be my go to in downtown when I’m at work.

Great sushi, great value! If I am feeling like sushi, this place is definitely the go to even with plenty of other flashy sushi places downtown.

Sakana Grill, the epitome of your average Calgary sushi experience.
AMBIENCE/​SERVICE: Relatively large restaurant that obviously looks like it serves a lot of people. «Irashaimase» was always on point and servers were generally no-​nonsense like most Chinese-​owned sushi places, sometimes even cheerful. Speed was pretty decent too. 1.5÷2.5
FOOD: I would only come here at late-​night when their specials like love boats and salmon nigiri go on sale. Their fish is ok, definitely not the freshest, and sometimes they get the temperature wrong, but this is nitpicking if you’re hungry at night after a long day. They do have a rather large menu with many special rolls. I usually order gomaae (spinach and sesame paste) and black cod, which are both pretty hard to screw up but still quite good. If the quality of fish went up just a notch, this place would definitely deserve an extra star, but it is still pretty good value late at night. 1.5÷2.5

Yummy. good sushi. magician
Show ⁶⁄₁₀ good for kids.

Nice spot. The sashimi pieces are nice and big with good texture. The rolls and other izakaya-​type items are also solid. I’d like to see more rolls without frying in them; most have some tempura ingredient.
It probably deserves 3.5 stars, but rounding up for value and the nice folks there.

Great food, great people working here especially our waitress Waw! Also cool magicians Irene and Yuu. Our first time here, from out of town will definitely come back. They also let us sit at The Sushi Bar even though it wasn’t open for dinner!

If you «loved» this restaurant or thought that the food or service was any good, you simply don’t know sushi… or restaurants.
Like most dramatic stories, mine begins on a wintry Calgary day. I contacted Sakana Grill through
and ordered an unagi don (eel on rice) and some toro (tuna belly) sashimi. A pretty simple order (albeit priced at $ 34).
The website promised delivery in 45 minutes. After said 45 minutes had passed, I received no food and not even a call apologizing for my inconvenience. When I called the restaurant, a rather rude man on the line informed me that the driver had been sent to the wrong address (keep in mind, the restaurant is a mere 13 minutes away from me by car – I couldn’t drive because my car battery had died). I said fine and continued to wait.
Another 45 minutes had passed and I still had no food! I called again and this time the man was even ruder to me (if such a thing is even possible). He informed me that it was not his problem that the order was late and that I should take it up with
(keep in mind that the website’s policy that late delivery is up the restaurant – only!).
When I finally despaired of getting any food that afternoon, the hapless delivery driver had arrived. He made no apologies for his unreasonable lateness. The unagi don was cold and I was given just a smidgen of rice (it’s a don, for god’s sake!). The toro looked dry and unappetizing.
My overall experience with the food and service at Sakana has been horrendous. Avoid this little shop of horrors at all cost!

I have always loved this place. I have been there countless times and every time the food, service, value and atmosphere are top notch! They always go above and beyond for the customer — every staff member says hello and goodbye to you.
Some nights they give you some frozen grapes in chocolate and a pack of pocky sticks with the cheque for free! Other nights they’ll have a magician entertain every table, or a live Grilling session during dinner time. They’re open late every night and that is a plus for me, because my sushi cravings always happen around 9PM… :)
Check them out!

This is the only place in Calgary I will eat sushi and drink Sake. I have try many and they are crap. At least they are not cheap on the fish. Little expensive on the sake otherwise everything else is great. The service is always good.

Good food with decent service. Lifeboat special, can’t beat the price and taste. Definitely try baked oyster (with cheese), and Dragon roll.

Cheap late night average sushi.
I came here late one night for what I heard was their sushi happy hour. Unfortunately, I found that there was poor service but some alright sushi. Considering the price, we received a lot of sushi and food. The quality was average but definitely good compared to the price paid. I also had some of the house sake which was quite good.
Come for the happy hour pricing, but otherwise you can find better sushi.

You know you’re hooked on Unilocal when you make a date with a friend just to earn a badge. But that’s exactly what I did with a fellow Unilocaler as we set out on a quest to earn the Sushi Sensei badge!
Not only did we want to earn the badge, but we also wanted to be able to compare the restaurants like for like. We decided that an order of California rolls would be our staple in every restaurant and we would supplement that with an order of the restaurant’s feature rolls. Now, you’re probably thinking «that’s a LOT of mayonnaise and fake crab». Well reader, read on, because although we risked OD-​ing on mayonnaise and getting mercury poisoning, we came out with some great tips for anyone seeking sushi in Calgary’s downtown area!
Sushi Stop #1: Sakana Grill
Our sushi crawl started at Sakana Grill in Chinatown. On arrival, we were seated in a cozy booth and welcomed with a complimentary spicy salmon roll. It was delicious, so these guys were already in my good books. Everyone loves a little something for free, even if it just wets your appetite for more!
We settled on an order of California rolls and an order of Geisha rolls (mango, avocado over sun dried tomato, finished with mango sauce & sweet spicy sauce). The mango rolls were to die for. In fact, of all the restaurants we visited on the sushi crawl, these were my favourite rolls. They had a great combination of sweet and spicy and the presentation was beautiful.
California rolls leave little room for creativity, but these ones were good. Not great, not bad, but good. I wish I had more to say about them, but they absolutely met my expectations for how a California roll should look and taste.
We also ordered a glass of their house sake, which turned out to be the best tasting sake of the evening.
Price wise, Sakana Grill is as you would expect. It’s not a fancy sushi joint. It is a nice, comfortable restaurant with average priced sushi. Our tab came out to about $ 30 for our 5oz glass of sake and two rolls.
I’m giving these guys a 4 because they went the extra mile… a complimentary taster on arrival, the best tasting house sake of all the sushi restaurants we visited, speedy and friendly service and a box of Pocky sticks to finish up. All that, and the sushi was good quality and tasty, especially those mango rolls.
Sakana Grill — I’ll be back!
–
L

I have to admit I would have never given this place 4 starts after my first couple of visits. We went later in the evening, and ordered the ‘love boat’. The boats are a great deal for the amount of food that you get, but there is a reason they’re a great deal… the fish is kind crummy and rolls are very basic… sort of feel like you’re getting leftovers.
HOWEVER, having gone back after not being impressed the first few times, I discovered the real Sakana — and it’s good! Lots of great specialty rolls — I find the mango sauce particularity yummy. The real crowining glory is the seared nigiri — tuna or salmon seared with a crème brulee style torch right at your table — AMAZING. My mouth is watering just thinking about it!
To add to the already fun and very traditional atmosphere there is a magician on weekend evenings, and chefs often putting on a show at the grills. Similar to Kinjo they’ll give a box of Pocky to the pretty ladies dining, which is always a lovely bonus!
I certainly suggest Sakana, but do stay away from the boats if you’re looking for the freshest fish.

I love going here when I have the munchies late at night on weekends. After 10, they have this excellent «Happy Hour» special, whereas the Love Boat sushi, sashimi, tempura, teriyaki and soup special for 2 is a mere $ 25. It’s a ton of food for that price, and I don’t mind the 20 min drive to partake a heck of a snack with my friends. While I would never say it’s the best quality, it’s still yummy and belly dead fish filling satisfying.
I would like to give a better review, but I’ve yet to ever try their normal menu or their teppanyaki girll offerings. But service is usually pretty awesome, the settings are kinda quaint with their faux version of a japanese home, and parking is rarely a problem. So until then, all I can really judge from what I’ve tried and it’s definately something a place to keep in mind when late night snacks are needed and Denny’s won’t cut it.

Great sushi spot to hit in Chinatown when all of a sudden you and your party decide on «anything but Chinese food!» but won’t hop back into their cars because they’ve already paid for parking :/
Sakana grill’s prices are a bit expensive compared to the better sushi joints I’ve been to (Wa’s is just a few blocks up Center Street) but they do have some unique items such as their tempura soft shell crab.
I ordered their Abure Rolls, which means it’s sushi slightly seared at the top. The waiter came by with a fancy blowtorch to sear my roll and my mom decided that her sashimi was «too raw» and asked him to toast her expensive pieces of salmon and tuna :(…+1 for Sakana Grill not taking the insult

I *love* this place! The food is always tasty, and they often give you complimentary extras that you didn’t order as a way of saying thanks.
I used to come here often in University and haven’t much lately, but not much has changed. Still a nice and intimate atmosphere, and there’s always Japanese music playing in the background. That said, I mostly went on weekend afternoons, so haven’t yet had a chance to catch any of the special evening entertainment like the magic shows.
Sushi, of which they have multiple choices, is an option here, but it isn’t the only one. They have plenty of cooked dishes as well, my current favourite being the Katsudon.
I haven’t come across many places in downtown Calgary that offers the same selection and variety for the price as Sakana Grill. It’s my first choice downtown when it comes to Japanese.
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