Ika Sushi & Bento

We have been going here for take out sushi for a couple of years. We always get consistent and good quality rolls. The place is a little quirky, but that is the theme for most places on the Plateau. The place is spotless and the waitstaff and chef are friendly and helpful when asked questions.
They have added Jumbo Rolls to their menu and I highly suggest you try them.
This place doesn’t pretend to be some high dollar sushi joint and puts out a good meal. Go in and try a quick roll for yourself. You won’t be disappointed.

Phở… Nah. We were the only folks in the restaurant which typically is not a good sign. First time there, based on a friend’s recommendation. We tried the phở and were very disappointed.

We had take out maki sushi and chicken un don. Very good sushi average pricing.

This place is BAD! When they first opened a few years ago they were okay but it has gone way down hill. In an attempt to keep they place open, I’m guessing, they split the space and half of it serves phở.
This place has being on Kitchen Nightmares written all over it.

We live in Sammamish and there are hardly any good restaurants in this area. The purple rice is a great substitution to brown rice for those of us who are health conscious. The sauce is light and less sugary. The service is always genuine and extremely attentive.

Ooh, it’s bad here, but then again, it’s a sushi restaurant in a strip mall next door to a hardware store.
I lived across the street for a while, and was really craving a salmon skin handroll, so I went to Ika.
I was warmly greeted, ordered a salmon skin handroll and a spicy tuna handroll and told it would be 10minutes. Those ten minutes turned into thirty and by the time I got my sushi, they weren’t handrolls, but I wanted to go home so I took them.
The fish itself was not fresh and my rolls fell apart pretty quickly. I ended up tossing the salmon skin roll, which I rarely ever do.
My advice: skip Ika and drive a bit further to Redmond or Bellevue for quality.

Pretty good for a strip mall place!

The only sushi option here in Sammamish that is near my home. Resonably priced and the fish is fresh. Their hot food options are good too such as the teriyaki chicken. Not the best, but for the convenience of being down the street from where I live, it is do-​able.

NO GOOD! I first tried this place when it opened a few years ago and at the time they made their sushi using this strange purple and horrible tasting rice. I decided not to return but last week I thought maybe I should give them another try. And although they are using traditional sushi rice now, my experience was horrible.
I spent $ 48 on a to-​go order and just as the cashier was handing me my order (which I already paid for) I asked for a small side of their spicy mayo sauce. She gave me a irritated look and asked someone in the back to get it. She then handed me a ¼ teaspoon container of the stuff and proceeded to tell me that I should have ordered it earlier because they normally charge for it. I was a bit shocked (and a little embarrassed) and immediately told her I would gladly pay for it. She refused but continued to give me hard hour about it. I couldn’t believe she was irritated that she gave me a ¼ teaspoon of spice mayo at no charge. I was so mad that I quietly left the mayo on the counter as I walked out with my nearly $ 50 worth of their product. And to make things worse, the sushi was horrible. Fishy, not fresh tasting and poorly executed. I will definitely not return again.

It’s close, convenient, expensive and not that great. Your mileage may vary, but I just can’t get over the rice, and the sticker shock gets me every time. About every three months I go back because it beats driving into Issaquah or Redmond (or Kiku in Bellevue, mmmmm) for a sushi fix, and inevitably ask myself why I bother.
On the upside, the staff is always quite nice, parking’s easy, and it’s convenient if you’re on the Plateau and like the taste of cardboard rice. I really need to stop going here, but my sushi addiction is too powerful to resist.

Excellent sushi and teriyaki, and in large portions to boot. I especially enjoy that their teriyaki has a lighter, more citrus taste — most sushi houses make ridiculously sweet teriyaki, but this one is an exception to the rule.

Solid three star restaurant. The atmosphere was inviting and our server was lovely and very attentive while we were the only people in the restaurant, but as it started filling up, she forgot about us and we waited for our check for an uncomfortably long period of time while trying to flag her down. We had the philly roll and the CA roll which were tasty, but it’s kind of hard to mess those up. The salmon in the philly roll was the color injected, fatty, orangish kind, but it tasted like salmon and I was hungry so whatever. My husband ordered the beef Yaki but we ended up leaving all the noodles on the plate and picking out the beef and veggies because of the weird taste of the noodles. Not what either of us expected. We had the gyoza (fried) as an appetizer and it was my favorite part of the meal — it had just the right amount of crunch without the icky slimy texture that you can sometimes get. We’ll probably go back for a late night roll run simply because it’s so close to our house, but next time we want the best we’ll have to travel into Seattle for sure.

I went in prepared for the wild rice mentioned in the other reviews-​I thought, we’ll why not try something different? Well-​the front of the menu had a great description of wild rice and the benefits. I ordered the 5pc sushi combo (5 pc of chef’s choice nigiri and California rolls-​$ 12.99) and a separate order of Ama Ebi (2 pieces of sweet shrimp served with the fried heads-​$ 7.99). My wife had Tofu Vegetable ($ 9.99) and my son had one order of Kappa Maki ($ 4.99). All of the sushi came on standard white sushi rice and the Tofu Vegetable had a side of white sushi rice. Hmmm-​okay, maybe they changed the rice. No problem. My wife tried a few bites of the tofu vegetable but it was so spicy it was practically inedible. I tried it too-​I like somewhat spicy food-​but it was a bit too much for me too. My sushi was OK, everything was fresh and the fish portions are generous (but not anything like, say, Musashi’s in Wallingford). The heads served with the Ama Ebi was nice-don’t find that in enough places IMHO. The service was slooooooow. One woman was serving the all tables at noon. When she asked how the food was my wife said hers was too spicy for her to finish. She asked if they could make just a simple avocado roll-​pointing at the Kappa maki «like that but with avocado”-something not on the menu. My wife then said «Just avocado-I’m a vegetarian.» She said yes. Eventually, after my son and I had finished our meal the server came back and said «you didn’t like avocado roll?» Ummm… we haven’t got it yet. It took a bit to get this communicated. She finally came back-​with a plate I had seen them try to deliver earlier to another table-​that was something like a California roll, covered with flying fish roe. *sigh* We did our best to explain through the apparent language barrier that 1) It was really kind of too late now, and 2) fish eggs really don’t appeal to a vegetarian. I asked for the check. Server disappeared, came back after a while and offered to top off the ice water. Hmmm-​see, no food left… asked for the check again. My wife took off, headed to Taco Time for a bean burrito. Third time-​I asked for the check, and finally got it. The waitress hands it to me and says «Next time you know to ask for not spicy.» Yeah, I don’t think there will be a next time. And really, $ 4.99 for a serving of Kappa Maki? Wow.

I couldn’t believe that they call this Japanese food! It is served with purple rice and Korean style dishware. I am not familiar with Korean food, so this may be good if you are looking for a Korean style meal, however this is NOT Japanese food. Atmosphere was clean but not cozy with bright florescent lighting.

This fish tastes great! Staff are very friendly and treated us to a special Korean roll last weekend. Better yet they are across the street from my house. So we won’t have to travel far when guests visit to go out for Sushi.

Give it a try again since looks like lots of changes on the menu. Now they carry student menu and today’s special.
The portion is just way too small. We ordered a Pork Ramen and we got about 6 pieces of pork with the size of half of a dice each. The Ramen was made from the instant dried one you get from Uwajimaya.
Today special was quite nice on the order hand. Some deep fried tempura. I think the price of this dish is fair.
They no longer use any wild rice, etc… No more purple stuff. No masago sprinkle on the california roll.

I went here for dinner last week with a group of about six. The service was very friendly, if a little slow, but to make up for that we were offered a special sushi dish at the end of our meal (too bad we were so full already).
In terms of atmosphere, this is definitely not the cosiest sushi restaurant I’ve been too. It’s very basic and seems to be set up for quick, casual dining. For dinner, it’s a bit sterile and cafeteria-​like.
Their sushi is decent but not great. As mentioned by other reviewers, they exclusively use wild rice which is red/​purple. It has a great flavour, but visually I think I prefer the contrast of white rice against the fish. I had a deep-​fried roll that was excellent, and the nigiri sushi was fresh but a little tasteless. (They slices of fish on the nigiri are very generous)
Definitely a place I will try again.

I was really puzzled by the red/​purple rice. I’ve seen this type of sticky rice in Korean restaurants, and I have nothing against it. But not in my Sushi, please! I ordered beef-​don, but I got chicken dish instead. I didn’t like the regular mushroom they used, shitake-​mushroom should be the choice in this type of dish. I ordered my food to go, so I don’t know about the whole dining experience there. The atmosphere seems to be good, but it was definitely understaffed.