Sasaya Japanese Restaurant

Once upon a time, this was one of Toronto’s best Japanese restaurants — tatami rooms and all. Open for something like 20 – 30 years. My Mother took me there as a child and I believe it was where I first encountered Tempura, which blew my mind. Along with the grace and elegance of Japan in general.
Sad to say that a few years back they had a large renovation take place which was totally unneeded in my opinion.
When I returned for dinner, I walked in to immediately notice that the place was empty. Where were all the regular Japanese customers? Then this awful smell hit me. Totally off putting. Then I looked down to see that I was standing on top of large letters written… in Korean. The issue I have is with this fake-​Japanese food crap. If you can’t do it right, don’t try. Chinese, Korean and Westerners all try their hand at Japanese cuisine. They always screw up the etiquette, the beauty, the taste and the smell (or lack of it). The only improvement is the price! But then again, aren’t the best things worth paying for?
Anyway, this is the way of most of Toronto’s Japanese restaurants. The old Japanese retire and young Asian’s buy them up hoping that a kimono and garbled «irasshaimase» will save them. But something gets lost along the way and they normally close within a few years down the road.
I’m not for «ethnic» purity in food (god knows a huge chunk of Japan is korean anyway and vice versa), cultures always learn from each other, but the Japanese are good at what they do from a culinary perspective — if you want to take over their establishments, do so! But keep the bloody chefs and staff members so you don’t ruin a place as good as Sasaya — which by the way, totally sucks now!