I have never been to a sushi restaurant I love more than this place. It's hands down my favorite sushi restaurant so far. The ambiance is good, the food is fantastic, the prices are fair, the service is great. I always try something new when I go and have yet to be disappointed but I always get the sweet shrimp- they serve it with the head fried. Not all places do that, in particular sushi buffets, which I'm not very fond of.

positive

This review is based on the sushi portion of this restaurant so perhaps I would need to update this review if I ever return to Narai for the Thai portion of their menu, although, that will be highly doubtful as I interpret skunky, fishy tasting sushi to be indicative of the overall quality of everything that the restaurant serves. We arrived at least ten minutes prior to the end of happy hour and ordered drinks. I ordered a specialty martini which was supposed to be one of their signature drinks despite the fact that there was no one on staff who actually knew how to make it. Due to the delay in making the drink, and therefore, the delay in ringing in the drink order, happy hour had ended and I was charged full price for my drink. Strike one, but still looking forward to the food. We attempted to ask for a vegetarian version of the spring rolls which are served fresh in rice paper and not fried. The waitress told us that everything is pre-made and they could not make any that didn't already have the shrimp in them. Okay, now that's just a bad sign. Putting raw shrimp in with veggies and leaving it to sit? That's a case of food poisoning just waiting to happen. We obviously passed on the spring rolls and ordered some sushi, all of which was not in the slightest bit fresh and tasted very fishy. We lucked out with the fact that they actually forgot to make one of the rolls and requested that they not fix the error and rather, simply bring us the check. We left feeling rather nauseated by the whole experience and I can't think of any crazy, cataclysmic circumstances that would actually bring me back through the doors to try a second experience here.

negative

Soooooo, when my food finalllllyyyy arrived, it was GOOD. There were other dishes I saw that I wanted to devour but my heart was set on the Longsilog. It was good, same as Manila Sunrise, just got faster service over there because it wasn't as busy. They also had an American menu for burger, fries, popcorn chicken which worked out since my husband isn't fond of Filipino food. (ruude). lol the price was fair since there aren't a lot of filipino joints in AZ so I don't care if you charge me extra for a extra helping of garlic rice. They take cash and card, and there's plenty of parking. Oh and if your looking for the place on yelp and you push Get Directions when your coming down Dunlap, it won't tell you if it's on the right or left and you might miss it. It's on the left. :-)

positive

The great scholar George W. Bush once delivered the wise words "Fool me once, shame on you.....you fool me you can't get fooled again"....apparently this one along with many other of his sayings were unfortunately untrue. I ventured here nearly a year ago when they took over a previous smoothie joint and the decor and general feel looked very promising and after trying some concoction with berries, kiwi, and some citrus, I thought it was fairly one-dimensional, maybe a tad watered down, and had no desire to invest in a punch card for return visits. Fast forward to today when I needed a pick-me-up before jumping on the highway for my half hr commute home from work. With 20 yelp reviews averaging 4 stars, I figured it couldn't be half bad, right? By no means am I a smoothie snob, since I've had my share of overly sweet, watered down, improperly proportioned mixture of fruits, or too much additives like yogurt or vitamin supplements, and I've been completely OK since it's all mostly healthy stuff compacted into liquid form involving less effort on my part and fairly palatable. Walking in, I noticed there was a large poster advertising a "seasonal pumpkin smoothie perfect for the fall!" which was strike 1. Strike 2 was when I asked about the all fruit smoothies made with fresh fruit and the guy behind the counter was like "Oh, you don't want to try those since they taste too sour"......let's take a step back and think about this....we're not talking about catching salmon right off the coast or farm raised chickens here, this is fruit you pulsate into a blender with ice and perhaps some sweetener, shouldn't one be able to find some decent fruit down the street that has some resemblance to the fundamental taste of sweet? Now as I'm about to pick one of their standard ones with frozen fruit juice, he then talks me into trying his personal favorite..."the Islander" with fresh guava, peach, pineapple, and passion fruit? Kinda ambitious since none of these fruits are necessarily available or in season. Had I not been anxious to rush home and get my smoothie on the go, I would have immediately returned this concoction and had him personally taste my smoothie not to necessarily prove a point, but to have him swallow a mouthful just so he could empathize with my experience. Pretty sure the island this smoothie was named after was Antarctica since there was nothing resembling a fruit flavor in this beverage and the predominant flavor was crushed ice. Vitamin water would have tasted like a milkshake compared to this watered down mess that was "1 lower" if the Spinal Tap volume knob had a measure for sweetness. There were chunky bits of fruit that I could not identify as anything within the description and reminded me of the rough core of an unsweet pineapple or the white rind of a watermelon....completely unpalatable on any level. I imagine when the Nazi guy chose the wrong cup in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, his reaction may have been the same as when he took a sip of the Islander (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WtcZv89Hspk). It's one thing to be duped for picking the wrong item on a menu, but when you go for what's considered the premium stuff (fresh fruit) and get the personal staff endorsement (the Islander), it is pretty inexcusable for something that can be made at home with a blender and an accessible supermarket of any level of quality. I shalt not be fooled again...
negative