KAZE SUSHI
ADDRESS: 40117 10th Street W, Palmdale, CA 93551
After doing a bunch of reviews of places that are either out of town or closer to LA, I decided that it was time to start exploring my town’s restaurants again. This led me to check out Kaze Sushi, located in Palmdale and recommended to me by my friend Jackson. I’ve been able to try several different sushi restaurants in the AV, and I hadn’t heard of this one until Jackson recommended it to me, so I was curious to see how it stacked up.
It was last week after work that I stopped into the restaurant with Jackson for dinner. The dining room itself is not too large, maybe able to accommodate around 40 people total. I did like the warm temperature lighting, the various Japanese artwork that was up on the walls, along with a lot of wood and bamboo décor elements that did feel more accustomed to the Asian style.
If you took a look at the sushi menu, you would be able to see that there is certainly no shortage of rolls to choose from. I had to take a bit of extra time to peruse through the over 50 different rolls that they offered to help make my decision. The menu was primarily separated between three types: fresh rolls, tempura rolls, and baked rolls. There were honestly rolls from every section that sounded good, but in the end, I decided to go for the Golden Tiger Roll and the Blue Ocean Roll.
There were probably four other tables that were seated when we had gone into the restaurant, so it seemed the sushi chefs had a pretty manageable order load. During the course of our meal, I did see that there were several people stopping in for takeout orders as well. (Jackson mentioned to me that the restaurant opened during the COVID pandemic as takeout only, so that made it all the more impressive to me that they were able to make it through and open up to dine-in as well.)
It wasn’t long before our rolls started to arrive to the table. My Golden Tiger Roll had shrimp tempura and avocado on the inside, with the entire roll deep fried, and topped with spicy shrimp and crab, eel sauce, and orange mayo. The one thing that was noticeable when I was looking over the plate was the heavy hand on the sauce that started to pool underneath the roll. That typically concerns me, since I think that too much sauce will sometimes overwhelm the flavors of all the other ingredients within the roll itself. Unfortunately, that did happen with this roll to a minor extent.
The only real flavors that I was able to get from the ingredients were the shrimp and the avocado. I didn’t really get any of the imitation crab meat flavor. The orange mayo was interesting (I thought they had meant spicy mayo but were instead describing the color of it), and I was able to get some of those subtle citrus notes in there as well. I do think that this roll would benefit from a lighter application of both the mayo and the eel sauce, as that would let the other flavors shine through more.
The Blue Ocean Roll ended up taking a bit longer to come out, since it was a baked roll. Spicy tuna and avocado on the inside, topped with blue crab and spicy mayo that got baked, before getting finished with eel sauce and sesame seeds. I was definitely able to discern the blue crab flavors along with the tuna, and I thought that the spicy mayo added another nice flavor to the overall bite. The eel sauce helped to provide that pretty strong savory punch as well. Overall, it was one that was pretty enjoyable.
I will say that I did get some eater’s remorse after the meal with regards to my selection of rolls. Without getting something from the fresh rolls section, I don’t think that I was able to get a good sense of a roll with just the ingredients to help set it apart. I tried one of the pieces of the Firecracker Roll from Jackson, which was a California Roll and spicy scallop on the inside, topped with spicy tuna, panko, eel sauce, and miso mayo. I ended up enjoying that one more than my two rolls, and I think it’s primarily because that combination helped let the primary ingredients shine.
From an overall perspective, however, I thought that it was still a pretty favorable experience on trying another sushi restaurant within the Antelope Valley. The roll portions themselves were pretty good sizes and there were certainly a large number of different roll options to choose from. I do think that Kaze has become the spot I’d go to for sushi if I was up here, and I’m looking forward to my next visit where I can give some more rolls a try.
Let’s now take a look at the Kaze Sushi Restaurant Dish Spotlight. Asterisks (*) below mark my recommended dishes.
Golden Tiger Roll
Shrimp tempura and avocado on the inside, with the roll deep fried. Topped with spicy shrimp, krab, eel sauce, and orange mayo.
~><~
** Blue Ocean Roll **
Spicy tuna and avocado on the inside, topped with blue crab, spicy mayo, and eel sauce.
~><~
** Vegetable Tempura **
Assorted vegetables battered and deep fried.
~><~
** Monkey Brain **
Mushrooms filled with spicy tuna and imitation crab, deep fried and topped with eel sauce and mayo.
~><~
** Toro Sushi (pictured left) **
** Albacore Sushi (pictured middle) **
** Yellowtail Sushi (pictured right) **
Classic sushi with fish over a small bed of rice.
~><~
** Firecracker Roll **
Avocado, cucumber, imitation crab, and spicy scallop on the inside, topped with spicy tuna, panko breadcrumbs, eel sauce, and miso mayo.
~><~
** Albacore Delight Roll **
Spicy tuna, avocado, and asparagus on the inside, topped with albacore, fried onions, and Chef’s sauce.
~><~
** Popcorn Lobster Roll **
Imitation crab, avocado, cucumber on the inside, topped with eel sauce and orange mayo. Served with fried spicy langostino.
~><~
** Yellowtail Delight Roll **
Spicy tuna, avocado, cucumber, and cilantro on the inside, topped with yellowtail, jalapeño, and Chef’s sauce.
~><~
** Poppy Roll **
Spicy crab, avocado, and cucumber on the inside, topped with salmon, shrimp, and Sriracha mayo.
~><~
** Yellowtail Carpaccio **
Thin slices of yellowtail with jalapeño slices, Sriracha, and ponzu.
~><~
** Mexican Roll **
Spicy shrimp tempura, crab, and cucumber on the inside, topped with avocado, eel sauce, jalapeño, and orange mayo.
~><~
** Kaze Roll **
Tuna, salmon, spicy shrimp, and crab wrapped with soy paper, topped with avocado and miso mayo.
~><~
** Eel Special Roll **
Shrimp tempura, crab, and cucumber on the inside, topped with eel, avocado, and eel sauce.
~><~
And finally, here are my rankings for Kaze Sushi:
Food: 4 / 5
There’s no shortage of rolls to choose from, with over 50 of them to look through on the menu. There’s a good variety of different flavor combinations available with the mix of different ingredients. The one aspect that detracted a bit from the experience, however, was the heavy hand on the sauces with the rolls.
Atmosphere: 4.25 / 5
The dining area had good spacing between all of the tables, and I also appreciated the décor elements that focused primarily around wood and bamboo. The color scheme of black, red, gray, and brown was also well complemented by some of the decorative plants they had in the area.
Service: 4 / 5
I thought the two waitresses that helped us out for the duration of our meal were nice and stopped by to check in a couple of times during the meal. All of our rolls also arrived out to the table in a pretty decent timeframe as well.
Price: 4.25 / 5
For almost $16 per roll, based on the size of the roll itself as well as the quantity of the pieces, I thought the price ended up being a pretty good value. The majority of their premium rolls seem to hover around the $14 – $17 range.
Overall:
16.5 / 20
(83%)
Categories: California, Restaurants
Chu On This 