NO LONGER AYCE - Orange Fish Sushi House (Japanese)

Update: 2021-Aug-20 - There is currently no AYCE at this location post-lockdown even though it is now permitted, and it is unknown if and when it will ever return. I am therefore removing it from the active list, and will follow up periodically and restore it should it return to AYCE status.

Orange Fish Sushi House is located in a small plaza at 1107 Lorne Park Road in Mississauga, not far from Lakeshore Blvd. It is surprisingly small, the size of a small fast food place, with only five tables plus four bar seats. To add to this, the entire establishment was run by only one person performing the roles of kitchen and sushi chef, waiter and cashier all by himself, making this one of the stranger dining experiences we have had (we were the only sit-down diners at the time… I don't think he would be able to handle a full house, small though it may be.) Disposable chopsticks are used, thus I bring my own. Soy sauce was excellent and fresh and not salty at all. Ordering is from a menu onto blank sheets. Pop is AYCD, canned (which is rare) and amazingly also included in the meal price (which is even rarer and was most welcome on a hot day.) It was also nicely air-conditioned.

Though the situation was atypical, there were some nice offerings: Miso soup was very good. Salmon nigiri was excellent and with fresh salmon and good rice. Cream cheese roll was very good, like a Philly roll sans salmon. Butter fish, red snapper and crab surimi nigiri all were very good and very fresh. Spicy salmon sushi burrito is like a large maki roll (it is even wrapped in wakame rather than a flour wrap) and was pretty good.

And as would be expected with such a non-standard methodology, there were quite a few sub-par and caveat items: Mishy indicated that unfortunately the wakame salad was warm, soggy and mediocre. The green salad was good and fresh, and the dressing was alright although had a little peanut oil flavour, but it was much larger than normal, so much so a warning of the portion size is required; this was noted in many online reviews. Also, strangely, the salad dressing is presented separately in a bowl, something else I have never seen done elsewhere (as it is up to the chef to balance the flavours.) Another portion size to be wary of is that Orange Fish's maki rolls are eight pieces (and some possibly more); happily the avocado/cucumber roll was very good, so I didn't have any problem finishing it. Stir-fried vegetables, although very good, were also a very large portion about twice the size of what is served at other Japanese AYCEs; I was happy that Mishy helped me finish them. Mishy also didn't like the size of the nigiri which she said had excessive rice, but I did not find it as such as to me the sashimi portion was proportionally larger as well; still I must note this as not all appetites are the same size. Gyoza were okay, but a bit overdone. The chicken teriyaki don is (of course) served on rice, with more rice than chicken, but plain chicken teriyaki sans rice was not available… it was actually quite tasty but I was already "riced out" from the rest of the offerings and would have appreciated it without. (There are also no beef dishes whatsoever.) Sadly, the worst items were the tempura, which were actually not tempura at all, but instead merely breaded vegetables… this is because the breading was absolutely solid and not even slightly light and flaky (this has to be deliberate.) It certainly was not as good as the usual way because the batter hid the flavor of the filling, would not pick up the dipping sauce (which was actually rather good) and did not allow the vegetables' moisture to escape during the cooking process so they became somewhat slimy and unappetizing; I managed to finish mine but Mishy could not progress beyond the first one and I finished hers. There is no shrimp or crab/surimi "tempura", and unfortunately, there are no desserts at all, not even banana "tempura".

Orange Fish Sushi House was very good for its miso and sushi/maki items, and just excellent for the included AYCD canned pop, but I would avoid most of the remainder of the offerings. To be sure there were some good items, but those that were not or were too large dragged it down. I admire the chef's work ethic at doing all of the jobs on his own, but I think the strain is starting to show in some of the output. As well, to both of us, it appeared that all of the odd portion and entrée idiosyncrasies were biased towards cost reduction (though if so, why the free pop?) The weekend lunch price was $18.95 which although not the priciest is not cheap either even these days, and if I take off $2-3 by disregarding the free AYCD pop I'm still left with the same price point as some other establishments that still manage to provide reasonable portion sizes, properly done tempura, a full complement of the costlier items, and desserts.

Rating: 6/10