Irashai Grill

Located on Pender between Broughton and Jervis was the Irashai Grill with its ample street parking along Pender at $2.00 for 48 min (I think).  Classifying itself as more of an upscale izakaya place, I was pretty interested in trying it out especially with my trusty groupon. Came on weekday afternoon around 1 and was surprised to see only one other big table in the restaurant.  The host was gone and we had to wait about 2 minutes before he came back and took us to our table.  I believe the place is also Chinese-operated in case you were hoping for authentic Japanese.

The bar and lounge, and the dining area look like two completely different places with the dining area looking very upscale with the dark colors and brown leather chairs while the lounge area looks like a club with all the ceiling lights and round red booths.  There are TVs up in the bar area to appease those want to catch up on their hockey scores.  They were playing L'arc en Ciel in the background which was cool.

Red Tuna Sashimi ~ ($18) - While aesthetically pleasing, you could probably tell that $3.83 for a piece of sashimi probably wasn't worth it but you have to figure you'd know what you're getting yourself into at these places.  However, the tuna was very fresh and tasted great.

Lobster Roll ~ ($23) - 8 fairly sized pieces of sushi with a big lobster tail garnish at the end.  Inside you get the deep fried "lobster", mango, asparagus, tobiko and spicy mayo while shrimp and crab on the top.  They technically gave us scampi which is a variety of lobster but more like a jumbo prawn.  The scampi was overdone and kind of chewy. So after knowing that, I felt that it was a rip-off.

Sky Plate ~ ($14) - This is the more upscale lunch bento box (they had standard ones for $10) and it includes: 2 tiger prawn tempura, 2 vegetable tempura, 2 pieces of tuna sashimi, 1 piece of snapper and sockeye salmon sashimi, chicken teriyaki and your choice of 6 pieces of dynamite/california rolls and miso soup.  The tiger prawns were real, the chicken teriyaki was more like soy chicken without the deep fried goodness, and the dynamite roll was mainly a big chunk of shrimp with spicy mayo.  I wasn't very impressed with this plate.

Matcha Creme Brulee ~ ($5.50) - Good flavor but small quantity.  Nice teardrop plate though.

Overall rating: 6/10 - Irashai Grill has a very nice decor and atmosphere and the service was really good and attentive.  Food was tasty but overpriced and you definitely wouldn't get any value here.  Even though I had a groupon, they had to take a $2.50 administrative fee so that my $40 groupon soon became $35.  $35 might seem like a lot but that amount is already gone in two dishes and you'd still be left starving.  If you'd been keeping track of prices, a $70 lunch for two is pretty steep and I think there are better izakaya places out there where you'd get more bang for your buck. 

Irashai Grill

1368 West Pender Street

Vancouver BC V6E 4S9

604-688-8697