Metrotown’s Tomoya Sushi finds a winning combination with rich, innovative sauces and minimalist seafood dishes
Alfie Lau
Sun
Tomoya chef Vincent Zhang with the Black Sun, which includes chopped scallop, tuna, salmon and tobiko topped with a quail egg. Photograph by : Ward Perrin, Vancouver Sun
The first thing you’ll notice when you step into Tomoya Sushi — a cosy Metrotown eatery — is the bright yellow shirts worn by staff.
But after taking a couple of bites of their Japanese-French fusion-style cuisine, you’ll be talking about the food, not the attire.
Tomoya, which means “good friends” in Japanese, opened last autumn, with owners Stuart and Stephanie Xue and their partner Vincent Zhang looking to offer more than just Japanese food.
The idea of Japanese-French fusion appealed to Stuart and Stephanie, who wanted to combine rich French sauces with minimalist Japanese seafood offerings.
“Our focus was on bringing together some flavours into dishes you won’t be able to find anywhere else,” said Stuart. “We had Vincent looking to put together the right recipes, the right combinations on some rolls that our customers are really enjoying.”
On a nice summer afternoon, I and some “good friends” visiting from Edmonton decided to see what Tomoya was all about.
My friends loved looking at Tomoya’s menu, as pictures accompanied many of the more adventurous dishes offered. They remarked there wasn’t anything comparable in Edmonton and were eager to mix the traditional with the new.
For our appetizers, we stayed in our comfort zone, ordering a California roll topped with tobiko (fish roe); the 11-piece assorted sashimi and some veggie tempura.
The California roll, always a safe choice, was a nice appetizer but I was more interested in the sashimi. The veggie tempura was a pleasing hot dish that was neither too oily nor too hot.
We continued with three of the signature rolls — the Tomoya, the Philadelphia and, because we were in my hometown, the Burnaby. Each came in eight hefty portions. The Tomoya, topped with shrimp, and the Burnaby, which is wrapped around tempura and crab, were very good, but paled in comparison to the Philadelphia roll, which featured large slices of salmon sashimi on top. Add in the Philly cream cheese drizzle and you have a simply mouthwatering dish.
Tomoya also doesn’t scrimp on size or traditional Japanese menu items.
We decided to share the tempura udon, which for $6 gave us a heaping soup bowl of noodles and five pieces of tempura. We also ordered the beef steak teriyaki on rice and the unagi don (barbecued eel on rice).
“The eel is done almost perfectly,” my friend said. “It’s a hard dish to do well because it’s often overdone. But this is the best I’ve had.”
The udon would have probably been a better choice on a cold night but for $6, it was excellent value. The beefsteak teriyaki, which we ordered medium rare, was a nice way to finish the meal.
“We’re very happy with how business has gone since we opened,” said Stuart of the 33-seat restaurant. “We’re always really full on the weekends and we’re making sure that our quality is always consistent. We think we’ve hit on some good recipes and if we keep that consistency, customers will keep coming back.
“We’ve already heard from customers that they love our rolls and will come back just for a Tomoya roll or the Philadelphia roll.”
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AT A GLANCE
Tomoya Japanese Restaurant
A1-6285 Nelson Ave., Burnaby (corner of Nelson and Kingsway)
604-437-8839
Open seven days a week from 11 a.m. to 10 p.m.