[Santa Ana] [Japanese] 迴鮮 Kaisen Kaiten Sushi Bar

Kaisen Kaiten Sushi Bar
迴鮮
3855 S Bristol St
Santa Ana, CA 92704
(714) 444-2161

We've been wanting to try Kaisen Kaiten Sushi Bar for a while.  I read somewhere that this place was owned by the same company as Kula Sushi.  After two delicious dinner experience at Kula, we wanted to visit Kaisen even more.



We visited on a Sunday night around 7pm.  There were a few parties waiting in front of us.




Kaisen is a lot smaller than Kula.  We waited for about 30 minutes.



There are different prices according to different plate colors.  Besides sushi and rolls, Kaisen also offers udon noodle and tereyaki bento box.



They had a few special hand roll with $1 off regular price daily.



We were so hungry when we were seated after such a long wait.  We were ready to eat!


Fried Oyster ($2.75)

I spotted Fried Oyster, and got really excited.  Well, the excitement soon died after I took a bite.  The fried oyster was completely cold.  And you all know how gross cold fried food tastes like.  Who knows how long the fried oyster has been sitting out there.  It was just bad.  Dr. P refused to eat it after a bite.


Spicy Tuna Hand Roll ($2.75) / Fried Salmon Hand Roll ($1.25)

So we waited and waited for the sushi to come around on the revolving belt, but there was no sushi.  Then we realized that we had to order the sushi on an order form, place it on the revolving belt, and the chef would make the sushi and put it on the revolving belt for us.  But if we were just ordering sushi, what was the point of the revolving belt?  Why not just ask the waitress to bring it then?  I thought the fun of revolving belt sushi is that you get to see the food then decide if you want it or not.  So we started by ordering some of their hand roll.  Spicy Tuna Hand Roll was quite good.  Fried Salmon Hand Roll was one of their daily special hand rolls.  The cooked salmon was surprisingly tasty.


Salmon Skin Hand Roll ($1.75) / Eel Hand Roll ($1.75) / Negitoro Hand Roll ($1.75)

Those three hand rolls were all on the special menu.  Salmon Skin Hand Roll was great.  Eel Hand roll was just alright.  I probably wouldn't order this again.  Negitoro Hand Roll was the best!  Toro was chopped with chives, and it was so delicious!  We immediately ordered another one.


Albacore Sushi ($1.75)

Albacore Sushi was topped with some onion slices and ponzu sauce.  It was good, but we both commented that Kula sushi's pieces were much bigger.


Sweet Shrimp (Amaebi) Sushi ($2.75) / Spanish Mackerel (Aji) Sushi ($2.75)

Sweet Shrimp Sushi and Spanish Mackerel Sushi were both fresh and pretty good.


Yellowtail (Hamachi) Sushi ($2.25) / Scallop (Hotate) Sushi ($2.25)

Did the chef overheard us talking and gave us bigger piece of fish?  Yellowtail was bigger, and is was delicious.  Scallop was alright.  It wasn't all that sweet.


Medium Fatty Tuna Sushi ($3.50)

They have a Medium Fatty Tuna Sushi for $3.50 and a Fatty Tuna Sushi for $7.00 on the menu.  We only tried the Medium Fatty Tuna.  The tuna was so creamy and just melt in your mouth.


Bluefin Tuna (Akami) Sushi ($2.75) / Yellowtail (Hamachi) Sushi ($2.25)

Then the fish went back to the normal smaller size.  Bluefin Tuna sushi was good.  Yellowtail was Dr. P's favorite.



We ordered a lot more other sushi, but they never came.  We couldn't even find the waitress, and had to ask a busboy about it.  He went to ask the chef, and came back to tell us sea urchin and oysters were sold out.  I mean, shouldn't they figure out a way to let the customers know when an item is sold out, instead of having us sitting there to wait and wait and wait?



We didn't get really full, and was totally unsatisfied when we left Kaisen Sushi.  What a disappointment!  Maybe we were expecting too much after reading all the good reviews about this place.  The sushi had good quality, but size was smaller.  Service wasn't all that good.  We both agreed that we like Kula much better.  It's unlikely that we'll return to Kaisen again.

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