Nisen, Woodbury

So after work, at my old job, one night me and my friend's Dan and Doug decided to go out to eat at Nisen Sushi as a bday/grad/end of work celebration for me, it was about 8:30pm.  I went to the one in Commack, mistakingly, and loved the food but did not like the atmosphere (too much like a shopping mall feel) and was excited to try the one in Woodbury since I have heard so many good things.

Walking in, the environment is completely different.  The tables are still plenty, with not too much room in between them, but the lighting/atmosphere/people are different.  It is much darker, a much more trendy feel, with most people being in the 20s and up.  Everyone is dressed city casual and a lot of the inside decor is trendy.  I already liked the feel of the Woodbury one more than Commack.

As we sat down we waited quite a bit of time for our drinks order.  It was a Thursday and seemed that the place was most crowded Thursday-the weekend.  When our drink orders were finally taken, after maybe 20 minutes, I decided to go with the Sake sampler (something I had in Commack).  We weren't sure of what to eat so asked for the waiter to come back but he took a bit of time to even bring out the drinks.  One thing I would highly recommend to anyone would be to try the sampler.  The sake in it is much more friendly to those who drink to much as it is sweeter, but with some increased intensity.

For food we decided to just order apps for the table, and ordered seaweed salad, sesame crusted calamari with sweet chili sauce, toro tartar and chilled kumomoto oysters.  Everything was amazing. The seaweed salad had a freshness to it that you look for when ordering it.  The calamari was hardly fried and went well with the dipping sauce.  The toro tartar was fresh, not fishy, and sliced perfect.  The oysters were delicious served with a kick with some jalapeno.  After all this food we still definitely needed to order sushi, even though we already ordered more than enough food.

We decided to order a sushi platter, something we were told was recommended for 2-3 people max.  Dan, as he does best, ordered more rolls just in case it was not enough, the mango hawaii roll and a classic roll as well i just don't recall which.  Our food came out a little quicker than prior service (probably because it was 930 already).  To start, the sushi place was definitely enough for more like 3-4 people not 2-3.  But the assortment was great and everything so fresh that we didn't care how much we ordered.  The mango specialty roll was amazing, I ate almost the whole thing!  And the other classic roll was fresh and big.  We also ordered 2 more sake samplers for the table, making a perfect end to a great night.

Overall, the food at Nisen is a+++.  I would never be nervous to order something different there and you are always provided with quality, but it does match the price don't get me wrong.  The service was not the greatest, granted the place was really busy and hard to navigate, but we did go at 830 on Thursday so i am a little surprised they were slow.  But I prefer slow restaurant eating and with the people I was with, the service was great.  The atmosphere for Woodbury is much better than Commack.  In the end I would recommend going to Nisen in Woodbury with friends, boyfriend/girlfriends, even parents and I would say that you would not be making a bad choice.