I was delighted to be invited along to a tasting event held at Yo! Sushi Bournemouth the other night to sample some of the dishes coming up in their new menu. Having not had the chance to check out the restaurant yet and being a huge fan of Japanese food, I jumped at the chance…

The restaurant is very clean and modern, with a conveyor belt carrying dishes between the tables. For the tasting event however, we were able to see the dishes being prepared by the chefs right there in front of us, before being handed to us personally.

The tasting menu had much more on it than I had anticipated, so it looked as if we were in for a feast…

While we were waiting for the food, we were given some salted edamame and a refreshing green cocktail containing Midori (melon liquor) and cucumber to whet our appetites.

Bullet-Train Katsu Sando

The first dish was panko crusted chicken thigh in a white bread sandwich with tonkatsu sauce (a tangy, fruity brown sauce); super simple but so good! It’s inspired by bento box food which you can buy at train stations in Japan and eat on the go whilst you are travelling. There was a smidgen of hot mustard in there too which gave it a delicious kick.

Yo! Sushi Training Chef Sean handing out the food… thanks Sean!

Fruity Beef Katsu

The next dish was panko crusted minced beef sitting on a bed of cabbage and drizzled with tonkatsu sauce. It was surprisingly light; not heavy like a regular burger, and the tonkatsu sauce was a nice addition. Thumbs up from me 🙂

Sweet and Sour Cod Nanbanzuke

This was my favourite dish of the night; delicious deep fried pieces of cod in a sweet, sour and tangy sauce. Chopped spring onion and nori (seaweed sheets), and grated ginger on top brought out all of the flavours so well; I devoured every last bite.

Seared Beef and Pickle Roll

A little twist on a fish sushi roll, using seared beef instead. I wasn’t looking forward to this dish so much as pink meat is not really my thing, but I ended up enjoying this a lot. It was in danger of coming off quite bland, but the shichimi (a spice mixture) sprinkled on top, along with some wasabi I added myself upped the game.

Izakaya Pork Teriyaki

This was my least favourite dish, just because I’m not a fan of pork belly or fatty meats, so I gave most of mine to my boyfriend (this was probably his favourite dish of the lot). It was wonderfully presented though, covered with a teriyaki glaze and with a softly boiled egg on the side.

Osaka-Style Squid

This dish of crispy-fried squid smelt quite funky; mostly in part to the bonito (fish) flakes on the top. Once you got past that though, the dish was really tasty. There was quite a large batter-to-squid ratio, so you couldn’t really taste the squid that well, but the accompanying ginger, bonito, spring onions, mayonnaise and tonkatsu sauce really worked with the dish.

Tokyo Banana Cake

I have a feeling this dessert was inspired by ‘Tokyo Banana‘, a banana flavoured snack cake given as a gift in Japan. I got my hands on some when I went to Tokyo a couple of years ago.

The cake was soft and light, being made up of banana flavoured sponge with cream and real banana inside, and topped with a little chocolate. The perfect end to the meal 🙂

At the end, we were given a very generous goodie bag containing tonkatsu sauce, yuzu kosho (a condiment made with chillies and citrus), soy sauce and a small bottle of sake.

Firstly, thank you very much to Kayleigh from Way To Blue, who got in contact with me the about the event – I wouldn’t mind more of these kind of things please 😉

I would like to extend a huge thank you to the team at Yo! Sushi Bournemouth (Natalie, Dee, Luchi, Sylwia and Tim) for being so welcoming and accommodating, and making our evening so wonderful.

Thank you also to the Yo! Sushi chefs for cooking all of our delicious food and to Sean the Development and Training Chef for introducing all of the dishes, serving them to us personally and being to receptive to feedback. We’ll be back, I’m sure 🙂