Whoaaaa first post! I used to write about horrible first dates, but I
don't go on first dates anymore, sooo... Instead I'll write about the
after-first date places we go.
So. Edamame.
Edamame
is sushi/grill restaurant in the Easton area, off Morse Crossing. The
Girlfriend quite enjoys sushi, so we went here for dinner one night to
give it a shot.
-Worth mentioning- All the "grill"
items are, as you may suspect, "hibachi style". So they basically cook
it on a flat grill, cut it to tiny pieces, and serve it with rice (and
soup or salad).
Aesthetic-wise, I think one of
Girlfriend's friends put it best when a picture was posted of where we
were. It looks like a mall food court. No, really, it does. It's very
clean, with a short wall separating the counter and the small, simple
tables. The seats are metal frame, with a transparent green plastic
bottom and back, which matches the horizontal green lines on the wall.
One nice thing is they do have two balcony rooms that overlook the food
court and feel much more "restaurant-y", but the overall sense of food
court is still there.
So, after reviewing the menu for a
bit, we settled on our rolls and threw down. The Lady also got some
soup because she was feeling a bit under, and apparently their miso
mushroom soup is pretty good. For those wondering, we got a shrimp
tempura roll, dragon roll (The Lady), spider roll, and blind date roll
(Me). Again, pretty good. It certainly wasn't the best sushi either of
us had had, but it was decent all around and didn't cause any deaths,
so that's a win. The only one that I've never seen elsewhere is the
blind date, which was easily my favorite out of the ones we got. We
also had a bottle of sake, which... was sake. Really. It wasn't
anything special, it was called Cherry Blossom but had no form of cherry
flavor (or cherry blossom flavor. It's actually pears or something).
It kind of felt like ordering an orange soda, only to be handed grape.
It's still a good soda, but it's not what the name implies.
As
far as price goes? Eh. I feel like it's too pricey for what they
offer, honestly. My general thought when going out to dinner is that
you aren't just paying for the food, you're paying for the atmosphere,
aesthetics, and service. If I want food, I can make that at home.
Sushi isn't "cheap" to begin with, and you can pretty safely expect to
drop around $20 per person at a decent place, or more (for just the
sushi). But considering the relatively limited menu and food court
feel, it just feels high. Overall, if memory serves, our actual bill was
around $65 for the two of us, and it wasn't even AMAZING sushi. Just
kinda... eh.
We did go back again, because it is a
really convenient location for both of us. We went for lunch, which is
counter service (making it feel even more like a food court), and it
just wasn't as good. We got crunchy ringo, shrimp tempura, mango crab
salad, and (I think) coconut shrimp rolls. It wasn't necessarily that
it was poorly made or anything like that, the rolls we chose just
weren't as good as what we had previously. Especially the crunchy
ringo, which will always bother me because "ringo" is the Japanese word
for apple, and one of the key portions is apple. Just call it crunchy
apple, people. There's no need to go "English Japanese Fusion Name!" on
it. Also, just not that good.
We did
decide, after the second outing, to just try other sushi places. It's
just not worth it to go to Edamame unless we need to be in the Easton
area and are just looking to grab a quick lunch. Again, it's not bad.
It's just not the best Columbus has to offer.
It's also
worth mentioning this was the first "relationship date" with the amazing
Lady. So, that could have gone better. There's actually a sushi place
closer to my apartment that we both like more (now that we've gone),
but went to Edamame instead. Basically what I'm saying is, if you're on
those early dates and want to impress, don't. Just don't. Go
somewhere else, and treat Edamame as that "quick lunch date" kind of
sushi place.
