Flying Fish! - Benihana (Orlando)

Overall Rating – 2.8 / 5

A little while back now, I went to Orlando for a few days on a work trip. Seeing how Florida is a peninsula, I imagined that the sushi there would be quite good, and may vary a little from the standard, using fresh fish from the Gulf of Mexico and mid-Atlantic. Unfortunately I was without a car and a little outside of Orlando proper (I was at a hotel more or less sandwiched between Disney and Sea World) and because of that I didn’t have quite the variety of restaurants to choose from that I had hoped. As far as sushi went, there were two restaurants within a manageable distance – Benihana, and Benihana (yes, there were two of them, and they were within about 3 miles of each other). Given the choice, my fellow sushi pioneer /BH and I went to the one that wasn’t in a hotel.

Disclaimer: Benihana is a chain, however I have not been to any other Benihanas. I cannot attest for the quality of any but the one I went to in Orlando.

On the outside and in, Benihana looked just about as stylish as it attempted to be. Don’t confuse stylish with “classy” or “nice” – it still had somewhat of a chintzy chain restaurant feel to it, but far less so than would an Applebee’s or Macaroni Grill, and I didn’t feel like I was being looked at strangely for showing up with a button-down vest and tie (although one of the sushi chefs did confuse /BH with Rain from the movie Ninja Assassin). Speaking of sushi chefs, I found it somewhat odd that neither were remotely Japanese – not to say that only the Japanese can make decent sushi, but it did strike me as a bit out of the ordinary to see a Hispanic individual behind the sushi counter. Regardless, we had places to be and inquiring about the career paths of our chefs fell to the wayside (as did taking pictures of the ambiance, a faux pas for which I sincerely apologize).

In a land where one would imagine you could get a fair amount of good fish, we went to a chain. Why? Simple. On certain days of the week, Benihana had $25 all-you-can-eat sushi. The only catch is that you have to sit at the sushi bar, which means no hibachi, so don’t bring a mixed crowd of sushi lovers and those who are not so keen. In the eyes of myself and /BH, however, sitting at the sushi bar was a blessing, as we got to merely mark off what we wanted on the sushi list and hand it straight over the counter. No waiting, no hassles, just sushi. Not a bad setup. Oh, and did I mention that the menu included nigiri? Because it did.

The all-you-can-eat sushi menu at Benihana. Click to enlarge.

Of course, they give you a generous portion of edamame, a miso soup, and a small salad, all of which are much less expensive than fish. I eschewed the edamame, which I’ve never been a huge fan of, ate the soup and salad while waiting for the main course, and shortly thereafter we proceeded to stuff our faces. See below:

My first plate of nigiri – Albacore, Salmon, Surf Clam, and Yellowtail

Benihana’s Las Vegas Roll – Salmon, avocado, and cream cheese, deep fried and then each piece topped with spicy mayo and jalapeno.

Part one of the meal of Capital Sushi’s /BH.

Rainbow Roll & Spicy Tuna Roll

…and that was only the first order. There were two more, albeit smaller, after that.

The rolls were, all in all, very well made. I tend to be a little rough on my sushi at times and both the rolls and the nigiri held up very well. My only complaint would be that they didn’t cut the rainbow roll into evenly sized pieces, instead they followed the width of the fish and avocado so some pieces were strangely thin and some were blatantly wide. The Las Vegas roll was surprisingly good (public notice: I slather sandwiches in may so a bit much of the stuff doesn’t offend me at all). The mix of textures and flavors was both pleasing and complex – more than I would have expected from a chain. Then there was the nigiri. The nigiri highlighted just how wrong I had been in making one incorrect assumption… Being on a peninsula surrounded by ocean on one side and the Gulf of Mexico on the other, I had presumed that the fish would be top-quality. After all, one would imagine that Florida of all places would have easy access to fresh fish, right? Okay, Florida’s not exactly salmon country but they still should have a good fresh selection, right? Seemingly not. The nigiri seemed largely drained of flavor, the telltale sign of frozen fish. It really wasn’t any better than the average sushi in upstate New York, if even that good. Honestly it was fairly upsetting. Not that it was bad – it was decent, but for a place so close to so much water, they should be able to do better. … Still, it was decent, it was cheap, and it was neverending, so all in all I couldn’t complain.

Would I go to another Benihana? Yes, under one of two circumstances: 1) if I wanted to stuff my face beyond recognition for what is, in all fairness, pretty cheap, or 2) if I saw one in a place not really known for its sushi, Biloxi, Missisippi for example, and I wanted a “safe bet”. I might even go to it on occasion if there was one in the Albany / Troy area, but when I’m travelling, it’s simply not worth trading the novelty of going somewhere completely new for the merely satisfactory experience of Benihana.

/CH

Benihana
12690 International Drive, Orlando, FL 32821
Tel: (407) 239-7400‎

Eat-In only

Hours:
Mon-Sat: 12pm-2pm / 5pm-11pm
Sun: 12pm-3:30pm / 3:30pm-10pm