This was my Valentine's Day celebration dinner with my boyfriend. Every year, I ask my boyfriend to pick the restaurant because I always find that it is the guy's job to do all the preparation for Valentine's Day d=
My boyfriend picked Aikawa, a restaurant in the West Island. For a long time, Aikawa had been our favourite Japanese restaurant. It's been a year we haven't visited Aikawa, so my boyfriend thought it would nice to have a lovely Valentine's meal there, but sadly, it was a d-i-s-a-s-t-e-r!
We entered the restaurant and noticed a big change in the personnel. I have a feeling that this is the reason that the very good Aikawa has become an amateur restaurant!
This was the Valentine's menu.
Since it was a menu for 2 people, I think it is just natural that customers expect 1 soup and 1 entree for each person. The waiter asked us if we wanted a soup or the appetizer Heaven Deluxe. This was not the problem, even though on the menu, it said clearly miso soup AND Heaven Deluxe, it was still ok to me. I thought that sometimes we make miso soup at home, so it was better to choose Heaven Deluxe, so both my boyfriend and I opted for the Heaven Deluxe.
The waiter came back with a soup and the Heaven Deluxe entree. Why? because apparently, it was not a choice. We have one soup and one Heaven Deluxe. Does it sound weird to you guys? I mean, it is a set menu for 2. Are we expected to share a soup? Ok, and then I thought maybe because it is a menu for a couple, and it was for Valentine's Day, so it could be cute and sweet to share a warm bowl of soup...but there was only 1 spoon...
This was the Heaven Deluxe. It was similar to a sushi pizza. Basically, it was a fried rice cake topped with smoked salmon and crab mixed with mayonnaise and caviar. At the moment I ate it, I found it ok, not outstanding, but not bad.
We could choose 3 specialities from the menu. The first one I chose was the Rainbow Sashimi because I am a sashimi lover. From far, the plate looked appetizing. When it arrived to the table, I noticed that the pieces of fish were not cut evenly, they were all of different size..but the worse was really the taste! If you are an asian and eat steamed fish, you know what I am talking about. The sauce taste exactly like steamed fish. I am almost sure it is the same soya sauce and boiling oil used for Chinese steamed fish. It tastes good but not for sashimi....it was very weird and the saddest part was that the pieces of sashimi was warm! Honestly, I found this Rainbow Sashimi more than horrible.
After the disappointing sashimi, my boyfriend and I expected that this Empress would impress us like before. This specialty was not part of the choices in the Valentine's menu, but since it was my favourite roll at Aikawa, we had to order it! It came nice, but the portion obviously got a lot smaller. The restaurant is not as generous in the sauce either.. and it made a huge difference. When we were eating this wonderful roll, we did not have the joy we used to have before anymore..and to be priced at $16, it was a disappointment.
Volcano is a specialty that we have had tried before. It is supposed to look and taste amazing. The waiter comes and he puts fire on the sushi roll. It really reminds you of a volcano. But on this night, there was just toooo much alcohol, the bottom sushi was like soaked in alcohol. I really didn't like it!
Lastly, there was the Summer roll. When this plate got to our table, I immediately told my boyfriend that I would never come back again if the quality is this poor. There was so much cucumber for this little filling, plus, the cucumber was a little dry. Funny huh?
The Mont-Tremblant dessert was a better success. It was vanilla ice cream served with deep fried Kinder Bueno chocolate. It was pretty good, but honestly, it really had nothing to do with Japanese cuisine. Although Aikawa has never been very Japanese in the decor, and even the personnel was not entirely Asian, we have always found that the food served to us was good enough. But this night, I just want to say that the new owner or staff should just stick to perhaps French cuisine and forget about Aikawa as a Japanese restaurant. This dessert was simple yet delicious. If the restaurant can continue in this path, it might have a brighter future.
Briefly, this Valentine's dinner was a total failure in my opinion. Not only the food was disappointing, service was incredibly slow too. The whole dinner lasted for about 3 hours, and it costed over 100$. For the price we paid, I believe we could have found much better food!
All those who have tried Aikawa before or recently, what do you think? Share your experience with us!
