Eatery - Kaisen Kaiten (CA)
Kaisen Kaiten - 3855 S Bristol St, Santa Ana, CA 92704
Pricing - $$ | Dining - Casual | Cuisine - Japanese (Sushi) | Reservations - Unavailable
Sushi sushi sushi. I knew that I had to have it somewhere at least once during my winter break and time was obviously running out so I told some pals o' mine that we ought to get it SOON. I deferred to them for choosing a place because they would be more knowledgeable about sushi stuff than I am. We opted to go to a revolving sushi place due to cost and actually made out of the dinner spending only $13ish each after tip. Hoorah. So because it was a revolving sushi place, we could grab things from the conveyor belt but we also ordered some things on their menu.
I grabbed the Inari (right) and my friend grabbed the Ahi Tuna (left). I was the only one who ate the inari though but I like that stuff quite much. It's vinegared rice stuffed in a bean curd shell; delicious! The one here was pretty good. The tuna was pretty good too, and though my friend said that the onion overpowered the fish, I liked the two together. Perhaps it's because I'm picky with fish since I don't like it all too much.
Despite its lack of raw fish, crunchy rolls are probably my favorite type of sushi, and I always keep my eyes open for them when I go out for sushi. It's basically tempura shrimp and some veggies in the middle of the rice with crisps on top and ponzu sauce. It's so wonderful. The one here was a little different from what I was used to because of the filling but I actually really liked it. It might be my favorite crunchy roll so far (though it's more expensive than I'm accustomed to).
So this place has a cool thing where you just stick your orders into a tube on the conveyor belt, and your orders come back out on the belt with your number as the platform. The above plate had four orders but all came on one plate for us so hoorah for that. The albacore on top left was pretty good though I found the skin part a little thick. My friend said that I might not like the white tuna on the top right because it was a bit too buttery...and she was right. That stuff was quite the slippery and soft slice. As for the lower part, it was my favorite but then again, I can't deny that yellowtail is delicious. It's got a nice firmness to it and slightly tart (to me) taste that I enjoy in all the yellowtail I've had before. The fish here seemed quite fresh as it wasn't fishy-smelling and I managed to eat it; normally I gag when I have not-so-good-sushi, hah.
Sorry for the poor picture. It was a bit dim in there and every picture with flash looked terrible. Anyhow, we each ordered one of the Negitoro Hand Rolls because it was one of the specials for the day (only $1.75!). I really liked it because there seemed to be a plentiful amount of fish inside and the rice had the right amount of vinegar in it. I still dipped this in soy sauce, however, because I wanted to make sure I didn't eat too much undressed fish, hah. The seaweed wrapper was also quite plentiful, making me work a little bit whenever I wanted to take a bite.
Another handroll they had for the special today was their soft shelled crab hand roll. My oh my was this delicious. I'm not sure what sauce they used inside but it was fantastic with the crab. I liked how the whole thing crunched in my mouth, and again, the seaweed was pretty thick so I had to tear at this quite a bit. I thoroughly enjoyed this choice.
As for the other stuff in the restaurant, I didn't try the wasabi but I did have some of their ginger. One of my personal measures for judging sushi places is how good and fresh the ginger is there. Kaisen Kaiten definitely had fresh un-dyed ginger that was seasoned just right to still give a gingery taste. I would come back here again for sure.
 | Reservations -...){kind=link}
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