Love high end restaurants, but not the prices? In downtown Ridgewood we have a variety of high end and affordable restaurants to choose from. We tried two different sushi places here in ridgewood. Shumi is a a high-end sushi restaurant with an average of 4.3 stars on Yelp .On the other hand, Masago is a discount sushi restaurant, with a 50% off deal every day. This restaurant also has 4.3 stars on Yelp, so we compared both restaurants based on the quality of the food,service and price. 

To start off, Shumi. The exterior of Shumi was much cleaner looking and put together. It has glass doors and big glass windows to see the interior. When you walk inside, you can see a sushi bar and a good amount of seating. The sushi bar has a nice marble wall, and granite counters. There, you can see the chef’s making sushi and other foods. 

As we walked in, the waitress greeted us kindly and seated us after a minute. The waitress seated us at a booth-like table. We waited about 2 minutes to get water and our menus. The restaurant had 3 more tables filled and wasn’t very crowded, making the service faster. After a few minutes of waiting, the waitress came over and took our order.

For appetizers, we ordered the Wakame salad (also known as seaweed salad) and Shumai. The Wakame salad came out first, and the Shumai shortly after. The wakame salad was Green, crunchy, and had a lot of sesame seeds on it. There was also a strong flavor of sesame oil and soy sauce. We then tried the shumai. We ordered Pork fried shumai and steamed pork shumai. It was really good but we preferred the fried over steamed Because it added a lot more flavor and crunch. Overall the appetizers were 8/10.

After about 15-20 minutes, the entree came out along with the sushi rolls. For the entree, we got chicken teriyaki. It came in a bowl with rice and chicken on top. The chicken had the teriyaki sauce on top along with a few vegetables such as broccoli and carrots. The chicken was soft and flavorful. The teriyaki sauce did not overpower the dish and you can taste the sweetness of the vegetables with the sauce. The rice was well cooked and sticky. We gave the chicken teriyaki a 9/10. After that we tried the rolls, we got the shumi roll and rainbow roll. The shumi roll is a tuna roll and  is topped with spicy mayo, eel sauce, and has seasoning on the top to add a crunch. It was extremely flavorful and the spicy mayo goes well and balances out the saltiness.  We gave the shumi roll a 10/10

Next we tried the Rainbow Roll. It is a california roll wrapped with tuna, salmon, yellowtail, and is also topped with avocado. This was a good combination of the avocado and the fish. It had lots of different flavors but went well together. With the soy sauce, it tasted even better. The rainbow roll was tasteful but nothing special so we gave it a 7/10. 

In conclusion, Shumi had ok service, great food, but the price was questionable. The food was very good and tasty if you are looking for a high-end sushi restaurant. The total cost was $85.65. The service we gave a 7/10 it could have been better and the food could have been faster. Their food was a 10/10. I could eat this everyday! Lastly the price was 7/10. It’s expensive, but so worth it!

Next it was ont to Masago to compare the two restaurants. The exterior of Masago wasn’t as nice as shumi’s. There was a window with a large sign that says 50% off everyday. When we walked in there was a pretty nice wooden sushi bar that had some fish and other items displayed in a glass case. You can’t sit at the sushi bar, but there’s a good amount of seating and booths. It also had really cool led lights over the seating. 

We were seated right away and the waitress was really nice and quick to give us our menus. We told her we were ready to order and she came immediately. We ordered Shumai and Rockies shrimp for an appetizer. We then ordered the chicken teriyaki entree and the out of control roll and spider roll. We got the shumai about 5 minutes in right along with our rockies shrimp. The shumai tasted just like the one from shumi for half the price. It had shrimp inside and was crispy and crunchy.Then we tried the rockies shrimp it was pretty good. It was spicy and salty, but the spice and saltiness balanced eachother out and gave the shrimp a good taste and crunch. We gave the shumai a 10/10 and the Rockies shrimp a 7/10.  

While we were finishing up our appetizer the chicken teriyaki and sushi rolls came out. We tried the chicken teriyaki first. The chicken came on a hot plate with broccoli and rice. The execution of the chicken teriyaki was really good because the chicken was so fresh and came right off the stove. The teriyaki sauce did not overpower the dish and it was very tasty. The chicken was not as soft as the one from shumi and the rice was also not as soft. Overall the entree was a 7/10. 

We then tried the spider roll first. It had soft shell crab,cucumber, avocado with eel sauce and fish eggs. The roll was delicious. The eel sauce was extremely good and the roll was nice and warm. All of the ingredients tasted really well together, we gave this roll a 8/10, definitely recommend it. Then we tried the out of control roll. This roll was topped with salmon and tuna, it had church and spicy mayo eel sauce. Again, the eel sauce tastes great with the roll. Inside the roll there was yellowtail and avocado. The best part of this roll was the crunchiness and saltiness of the church,mayo, and eel sauce. Overall the roll was a 9/10. The total cost of the food was about $75 not including tip.

All in all the overall quality and taste of the food were both great. The settings of both restaurants were different, yet comfortable. If you’re looking for a better bargain, Masago is cheaper with better service. If you’re looking for higher quality food, Shumi’s the place to go. To conclude, if you are looking for an amazing restaurant and don’t care about prices, Shumi is the way to go. If you are looking for good tasting sushi and a quick restaurant to stop by if you are on the go, Masago would be the right pick for you!