Sushi Yaki in Buffalo Grove

I was casting about for a sushi place near my friend's house in BG and this place popped up on the radar so we decided to try it. Not sure how long it's been there on the Arlington Heights Rd. side of the Jewel stripmall that's also home to The Buffalo restaurant, but I've probably driven by it and the Domino's Pizza that it's next to dozens of times without ever noticing it.

Anyway, they seem to specialize in "fusion maki" by which, of course, they mean huge crazy-flavor combo'ed maki rolls. We ordered a few of the more traditional maki and they were all pretty good. My friend is a non-sushi eater, so I ordered mostly rolls with cooked ingredients; they have all the usual suspects like a spider roll, a roll with unagi and avocado, etc, etc. we also tried one that had cooked salmon in the center and raw salmon on the outside and I threw in a spicy tuna roll for good measure.

I kind of knew that four rolls was too much food for the two of us, but this was really too much food. The rolls are huge. They could get away with serving half of what they serve and it would still be a decent value compared to other sushi places. The quality of the fish was fine, I liked the spicy tuna, and it's pretty hard to go wrong with unagi and fried softshell crab. Also, they brought the whole thing to the table in a huge wooden boat, kind of looked like a Chris Craft.

Overall, I found the place to be a very good value--bill was $45 for the two of us, no beverages (they're BYOB, which we didn't know), but we took home about the same amount of food that we ate.

Sushi Yaki Japanese Bistro
129 N Arlington Heights
Buffalo Grove, IL 60089
(847) 520-7850
sushiyakichicago.com/