Kansai Japanese Restaurant

6.5 Recommended

Food  7      Ambience  5      Service  5      Value  9     

Definitely one to keep in mind for a bargain meal. At first glance upon descending the escalator to the lower level where Kansai is situated, we were worried we'd come to the wrong place, as all we could see from afar was a sushi counter. But behold, around the corner was a huge Japanese restaurant absolutely packed to capacity! And with japanese customers no less, always a good sign!

Kansai is a noisy, bustling, casual eatery and is a great option for those wanting to stretch their dollars. A set price of $29.50 will get you unlimited dishes, chosen from a wide range on a set menu, including hot dishes such as spicy baby octopus, udon noodles and teriyaki salmon, as well as sashimi salad and various sushi rolls, plus favourites like chicken karage, soba noodles and gyoza. Not just your average limited choice of dull repeptive sushi rolls going round and round on a train - this place offers value with variety!

I agree with others though on the Dragon roll and Volcano Roll - the Dragon was lovely but the Volcano was a disappointment - drowned in sweet chilli sauce, no! Why? Ask them to leave it off if you order this! The service when we visited was very stretched because they were filled to capacity. But gladly this didn't stop our waiter from being very friendly and welcoming. He recommended a few dishes and prompted us to "order more, order more, as much as you like" - great!

The dishes from this menu are quite small, so order a few at once. Also, the wait between each dish was quite lengthy. The quality of food from this all-you-can-eat menu was quite good, but not great. However, from what we could see of the sushi and sashimi dishes being specially ordered from the regular menu, this place certainly can deliver the goods, as they looked fantastic.

I think I only just filled my quota in reaching my 30 bucks' worth, as I filled up quickly, but my hungrier companion, who ordered more than me, felt that this restaurant offered very pleasing value for money.

Don't come here expecting a comfortable, intimate dinner, as the atmosphere is busy, loud and casual. But I will say that it is a step above your average all-you-can-eat Japanese and must be tried at least once. A good value option.

Response from Management:
Hi The Rocker,

Thanks for your compliments and also your positive criticism on areas we need to work on.

As of 1st February 2012, we have started a new upgraded menu. We've also looked into all the areas we need to improve on and made positive changes.

Look forward to seeing you back!

Best regards,
Management

Jan 07, 2012 

8.5 Highly Recommended

Food  9      Ambience  6      Service  9      Value  10     

The food is top quality, particularly the dragon rolls. Great value for money when you take the All You Can Eat menu, $28pp is sufficient if you don't feel like hotpot and there's plenty of other seafoods to choose from even if you don't get Sashimi.

Small take-away styled restaurant but definitely would return over and over again because of food quality and fantastic value.

Response from Management:
Hi Kellyfroste,

Thank you for your positive comments!

Best regards,
Management

Nov 12, 2011 

7.5 Recommended

Food  8      Ambience  6      Service  8      Value  8     

We booked a table for 11 including 3 children last Friday night for a birthday celebration. A little concerned after reading a couple of the reviews. However, we were really pleased with the $28 buffet. Food was excellent and the service was prompt. We had no problem reordering lots of the delicious plates of prawns, chicken, bowls of noodles, dragon rolls etc. Even my Japanese daughter in law thought the food was very good. Great place for get-togethers and thoroughly recommend this great little restaurant. Didn't get to try everything in the very extensive menu and hope to get back there again.

Response from Management:
Hi Joy W,

Thank you!

Best regards,
Management

Nov 01, 2011 

6.8 Recommended

Food  6      Ambience  5      Service  7      Value  9     

After seeing advertisements for a $28 japanese sushi buffet I decided to try this place. Value? fantastic! All you can eat japanese for that price I've never seen before, we were greeted with friendly smiles from the waitresses all night however their service were a bit delayed.

The quality of the food varies. Tofu is absolutely horrible, volcano roll not much better either I could only taste sweet chilli in my mouth scampi sushi didn't feel fresh but again its $28 all you can eat so didn't expect much.

However dragon roll tasted absolutely beautiful and so do many other ugiri sushis for $28 I would definitely come try this place again perhaps next time trying the sashimi $38 all you can eat. Seriously great value!

Response from Management:
Hi Ziki,

Thank you for your positive criticism.

We have looked into the areas mentioned and have taken steps to improve. We have also started a new upgraded menu as of 1st Feb 2012 so please come back and check us out. Further comments will be appreciated.

Best regards,
Management

Oct 20, 2011 

5.8 Average

Food  7      Ambience  4      Service  4      Value  8     

We come here knowing what dishes we like and what to avoid. The service and ambience aren't great, but it is what it is and we enjoy good value Japanese.

Oct 08, 2011 

4 Below Average

Food  1      Ambience  6      Service  7      Value  2     

Tried the buffet last night, the food seriously very below average. Its also makes me think that has the senior staff ever eaten Japanese food?

The Agedashi Tofu were cold, and very hard. The so-called stir fried octopus is also means boiled octopus very spicy sauce on top. Volcano roll also means mixture of sweet chilli sauce with mayonnaise covered the taste of katsu.

I'm very surprise of the busy environment. This is definitely not Japanese standard food at all. I spent 50 dollars (included sake) in which I rather to eat back in Town hall japanese restaurant rather than walk up to Wynard to have this kind of food.

Jul 17, 2011 

5.3 Average

Food  4      Ambience  6      Service  7      Value  4     

I was at Kansai on Saturday, 12th March, 2011 for the buffet dinner. It was for a party of six. This is my first time at Kansai. Having read the review beforehand and seeing the great reviews provided on Eatability, I was quite looking forward to this all-you-can-eat, healthy looking buffet and even the pictures on the website looks remarkable. I thought, even if it was not up to expectation, it can’t be that bad, the sashimi boat looks fantastic!

Low and behold was I wrong. I’d like to give a more accurate review here than what has been provided by the other reviewers. I am not sure what Japanese restaurants were used by the other reviewers here to make the food comparison? But it’s far from accurate. That’s not to say all the dishes at Kansai were bad.

First, most of the dishes ordered did not reflect what was advertised and looked like on their website. Now I know actual dishes are never ever going to look as pretty and that well presented come reality. But when the actual dish is inferior and sub-standard that’s when you know you are getting ripped off despite this all-you-can-eat business. The following are what was ordered and how I rated and felt about the dish itself:

Agedashi tofu – was firmed and not silken like it is suppose to be, in fact I would go so far as to say (not that it was overcooked) just the cheap harden tofu was used. Gyoza – this was more like a fried dim sum crispy on the outside thing that one would get at a Chinese yum cha. The filling was this mush-up thing consists of garlic chives, broken down vermicelli and some other indescribable vegetation, and no sign of any minced pork. It looked and tasted like one of those frozen dim sum that you get in Franklins.

Yakitori – this was fine, plumbed chicken thigh meat, and generally fine.
Sashimi salad – the actual salad used here is cabbage and julienne carrots, kind of like a coleslaw mixture but with chopped up tuna and salmon in a Japanese citrus dressing. The fish was fine but the coleslaw salad did not quite hit the mark.

Dragon – this was fine, the rice was a bit dry. Katsu – this was also fine, nothing to complain. Edamame – well this comes in frozen before being re-boiled no matter where you go, so it can’t go wrong. Teriyaki eel – this was also fine, a bit dry and flaky. Teriyaki salmon – this was fine also, again a bit dry.

Baby octopus – this was remarkably good. Well cooked and very tender and a great chilli sauce that it was served in. Hand rolls – this was extremely bad. There was no vegetation that came with any hand rolls or any dressing like mayo, and the rice was just plain boiled rice, not the sushi rice that has been premixed with mirin and sake. So just plain old regularly rice and a lot of it too with a sheet of seaweed and whatever filling that was ordered.

Honestly you just couldn’t eat it – you would be stuffed with all the rice it came with. Prawn tempura – now this was the highlight. You get six per plate and I tell you, it disappeared in neno second! The prawns were quite al dente and the dipping sauce was good. With this, the only problem was, they just didn’t want to serve you too many plates. We kept on waiting and waiting and eventually had to give up and get our bill. They just kept on saying: oh we are busy at the moment, I’ll check on the progress of your order...this went on and on...So people order lots of prawn tempura right from the get go, because you’ll never get another chance!

Finally, the sashimi boat – This was the most disappointed Ever! And definitely Not recommending this to anyone, save your ten bucks! What you get does not even remotely look like what is on the website. For a start, you only get three types of fish, which I guess is the norm with cheaper Japanese restaurant that serves sashimi.

But to add insult to injury, you only get 10% of kingfish and the rest were salmon and tuna. The tuna looked and tasted it had just thawed from the freezer. Bland, light pink and that semi frozen look. It looked like it had that meat glue sticking the fish together (meat glue is the stuff that was featured on Today Tonight just recently). The tuna was disgusting. Salmon was fine and tasteless and everything was sliced ever so thinly. We only eat the salmon and kingfish. On second order, we asked that they don’t put any of that disgusting tuna on it.

What we end up with? Well six thinly sliced kingfish and about 24 slices of salmon. Never again!! The vibe was good there, the restaurant was pretty full and the service was pretty quick and efficient, but the food, well not that great, especially the sashimi boat on the buffet. Maybe they use different quality of fish if it was on an ala carte order? I hope this helps.

Mar 20, 2011 

1 Not Recommended

Food  1      Ambience  1      Service  1      Value  1     

This is my 4th time to this place and the food gets worst each time now it's uneatable food maybe it's the all you can eat they just give you all the left over food and rice maybe from yesterday? Thx for wasting my time and money I can get better food for the price after I order the second time I don't want to order anymore not because am full it's because it's rubbish and a scam.

Mar 17, 2011 

7.8 Recommended

Food  8      Ambience  7      Service  7      Value  9     

I reckon it's the best Japanese food buffet in Sydney! The food's nice and good quality, fresh sashimi and everything on the menu tasted great! Will definitely return there for another round.

Feb 21, 2011 

8.3 Highly Recommended

Food  9      Ambience  5      Service  9      Value  10     

Been here no less than 40 times over the last 3 years. Extremely good value for money and very fresh sashimi platters. I think I owe it to Kansai to commend them on their consistent good food and service.

Feb 14, 2011