St. Sushi

TL;DR: Decent Japanese food, and if you just have a bento box it’s very good value for money. Also wouldn’t recommend the tempura. ⁶⁄₁₀
Came in for a very late lunch (about 5pm, so maybe an early dinner? Linner? Dunch?) and had a tonkatsu curry bento, ebi tempura, and a St Sushi ISO, with a hot green tea. This came up to £22.95.
St Sushi ISO: ISO stands for ‘inside out’, which means the rice is outside of the nori sheet. The fish and other ingredients are however, still inside of the roll rather than outside, which is a slight disappointment. Salmon and avocado inside, nori sheet, sushi rice with flying fish roe coating (the roe, or tobiko, are the little red/​orange fish eggs). Avocado with salmon is a classic combination in sushi for good reason, the slight creaminess of fresh avocado playing perfect accompaniment to the salmon. The only way to improve it would be a bit of ginger, a dash of wasabi, and perhaps better quality ingredients, but for £3.50 the quality is great. ⁷⁄₁₀.
Ebi tempura: prawn tempura. The prawn was well cooked, but the batter left much to be desired. It was tasteless and felt stale, which leaves me baffled as the batter makes me feel as if it’s been cooked in advanced then reheated but the prawns are just fine. The batter is too important a part of tempura to ignore, thus dragging the dish down to be deep fried in abject mediocrity. ⁵⁄₁₀.
Tonkatsu curry bento: deep fried breaded pork cutlet in Japanese curry served with white rice. The bento includes Japanese pickles, a small salad, and 2 pieces each of cucumber maki, salmon sushi, and salmon sashimi. The sashimi is good. The sushi isn’t. The difference in quality of the fish used is immediately clear and the sushi rice is slightly too vinegary. The pork is well cooked, no complaints there. The curry is decent, but a little sweet for my liking, it also has a certain packet prepared quality to it, I’m not sure what it is about it, but it feels like the curry base came from a packet. I’m not saying that’s the case, but to me, that’s what it feels like. ⁶⁄₁₀.
Bento boxes are good value for money and the salmon sashimi is good. If you like slightly sweeter curries then this is the place to go. Other than their curry dishes though, their teriyaki is pretty good as well, solid ⁷⁄₁₀ from what I remember (not my first time here). The place to go for decent Japanese food at good value for money.

This place just moved down the street to a shiny new location a few months ago. You can see the old location if you’re standing in front of the new one, which is silly, but I like their new space!
Five of us sat in a spacious booth, and decided to order the set menu. There are several to choose from, which aren’t described on their online menu. Basically at least 2 people need to get it (don’t think the whole table does), and they just bring you tons of food. TONS. We went for the second cheapest, which wasn’t cheap at all — £18.50 — so only go for that if you’re really hungry. You can easily build a cheaper meal than that from the regular menu, but it was fun to try a lot of dishes.
We all got miso soup first, then some beautifully presented sushi came out — salmon nigiri, egg nigiri, and one piece of maki. The pieces were huge! I love how they give you the exact right amount for how many people are in your party, so no fighting. The fish was fresh, and the maki roll looked really precisely made. Presented on a granite slab, really lovely.
Then we got an onslaught of food. It was intense. Tempura veggies, shrimp, and crabstick. Seafood fried rice. Little fried chicken bites. Pork gyoza. Is that it? I think so. The dumplings were a big hit, really delicious. The chicken and rice were both a bit under salted, but I’m not going to lie, I really enjoyed them. Some of my dining mates weren’t sold on them — and yes, they needed more seasoning, but I guess I just love fried things! The fried rice had a really classic taste, reminded me of fried rice I used to have when I was a kid. The squid in it was too chewy though! I loved the tempura, big crisp fresh vegetables in a light batter (I didn’t try the prawns). And dessert was a creative but hard-​to-​eat tempura apple (warm) served with cold vanilla ice cream. Loved the differing textures and temperatures.
We didn’t come close to finishing! We were STUFFED but left lots of fried rice and some tempura and chicken bites. Only order this if you’re really, really hungry. But it’s a fun way to try lots of dishes! I’d definitely come back here anytime, for a set menu, some sushi, or some Japanese dishes I’ve not tried before. Pretty good prices for wine and beer, too.