1000 Sushi Islands

great food, horrible service. I’ve never managed to have everything I ordered delivered to the table. The last time, the server just stopped coming after making her first delivery of food, which wasn’t what we ordered. Never saw her again.

Second time in just over three weeks. The squid sashimi is fantastic again. The place has really upped its game and it’s now great food for an all you can eat sushi place.

This is a really good sushi AYCE choice if you are around the Carling area. Sushi and make rolls selection is decent though not the greatest. Quality is ok. I would say it is close to 168 sushi. The service is also OK and staff is friendly. One thing that I find very annoying is that they serve pop drinks in cans and do not have refills fountain drinks. C’mon people… This is so annoying !! Parking lot is very small. Overall a good sushi experience. I only tried the lunch menu so I can’t comment on the sashimi items.

Food wasn’t really good and did not taste fresh. Service wasn’t awesome either. Definitely not returning.

Went for a late dinner here on Friday night. We showed up around 9 and had to wait 20 mins for a table. This place is busy! I’ve been here multiple times in the past and know how good everything is — so it’s worth the wait!
The service is just OK — there was some confusion with food being delivered to the wrong table. The staff were, in general, very polite.
They have a decent variety of vegetarian sushi — my fav is the crispy avocado and mango roll. I could just order this for the whole meal and I’d be happy! The edamame is also good… and the shrimp tempura is delish!
This is my favourite sushi shot in Ottawa (so far!).

Variety of great choices like vanilla shrimp, steamed shrimp dumpling, great tempuras (crap meat!), mangoes. Reasonable price for lunch. A bit slow even though not so many people dining. Not so friendly waiter, did not send some of ordered food because he forgot, sent wrong order once.

Good food. Although, the salmon was a lower quality. still very good. The sushi island special roll was great! I recommend it ! Ok service.

Amaaaaaazing sushi!
No Debit. Cash or credit only, there is an ATM on site.
I had some sushi, some tempura, some edaname, a random slice of meat I didn’t realize that I ordered… and ice cream! The food was delicious.
It was my first time to this place, the service was decent, but from my restaurant experience your servers are supposed to be attentive, helpful, and quick…
Even the mints are delish!
I’ll be going back…

While I certainly enjoyed the food and company, this place is kind of creepishly gigantic. We were there on a Sunday for dinner, and there were quite a few people there, but even then it was only about ¼ of the restaurant’s capacity. This place is just too big space-​wise. It’s nicely renovated for sure, and the décor is cute, but it’s just too big. The booth are super comfortable, but unfortunately for me I had a kid smashing himself into the booth behind me which kind of sucked.
My sister and I split an order, which was wise since AYCE sushi is always a challenge! We started off with the miso soup which I really liked here and then we had some delicious sushi (I highly recommend the dragon roll and crispy avocado), deep fried tofu, spring rolls, and some bites of edamame and seaweed salad. We also had some tempura — zucchini and shrimp and both were nice. As I mentioned, the food was good — fresh and tasty. Oh, except the single scoop of strawberry ice cream Fauve G made me order for dessert — that was freezer-​burnt, but a nice palate cleanser!
The service, however, was awful. Our hostess hardly spoke and none of the several servers we had spoke to us at all. When we went to pay we were told they only take credit and cash. They didn’t mention they had an ATM around the corner (which we only discovered on our way out, after we all had to make alternate payment arrangements (who doesn’t take debit nowadays?!).
I’ll absolutely be coming back here for the quality of the food alone, and the fact that it’s always fun to do AYCE with friends, five minutes from my place. We got there around 5ish, (I know, what a random hour to eat) and were charged $ 21 for dinner service. It was totally worth it for the crazy amount of food we consumed! AYCE tip: always order less first. You can always order more, but you don’t want to have to pay for extras or come up with clever ways of hiding your rolls under napkins.

This used to be my go-​to sushi buffet in Ottawa, but service has been so bad recently that I refuse to return. I’m pretty sure there was a change in the owner/​management.
The sushi is great, but they rice to fish ratio is a little on the heavy side. I love all the cooked food. The teriyaki and the fried scallops are the best. Tempura is fantastic as well.
Service has gone downhill; they always forget an item or two for each order slip that I write up. By the 3^rd slip you end up being confused on what your actually going to receive to eat. I’m starting to think they do it on purpose, because it’s always the most expensive items (tuna/​sashimi/​etc.) that always get missed. It gets pretty annoying when you have to constantly hound down servers to serve food. The kitchen has also gotten really slow, it took a good 20 minutes before we got our 3 rolls when the restaurant was empty.
Tip: They have a buy 10 get 1 free ticket stamp. :)
If you have patience try the place out. I came for the food, and I won’t be returning because of the service.

This place has improved 100% from when I started going there two years ago. Two years ago, the food was hit and miss and the service was something to be desired, but that is the case with most AYCE sushi places.
They have recently renovated and the place looks FANTASTIC!
The food has improved and so has the service. We always get our food quickly and the orders are (mostly) accurate. If there was a mistake made then the food is taken away without incident.
If you went here in the past and had a bad experience, I urge you to give it another try!

I live in Chapman mills which is a 2 minute drive to 1000 island sushi however I always drive 30 minute to go some where else.
The staff doesn’t speak english so they’ll always get your order wrong.
The sushi is terrible, and they don’t really offer anything else unlike the new fusion sushi places which will have chinese food and thai food.
I highly do not recommend this place.

Sushi… One of my favorite topics!
I used to live right across from this place and let me tell you, was it ever hard to say no. I am ashamed to admit, I even went alone a few times, and buried my nose into a magazine to avoid making eye contact with people. Oh well, I like sushi! When I want it, I’ll have some!
In any case, I do agree with many of the reviews below, that yes, the service is definitely below par. Some of the servers barely speak english. (Which baffles me as to why some of their name tags say «Sue» or «Jen». Is that really their names?)
If you put aside the shotty service, the sushi is probably the best I’ve had for all you can eat in Ottawa. It’s tied with a few of the newer places and now actually has some competition! I have always enjoyed their tempura, as well as their dynamite rolls. They’re also introduced a mango roll recently on their newer menu that just makes me go Mmmmm!!! My stomach is growling just thinking about it.
I’ll be back, though. Hopefully not alone next time!
***The only pointer I can give — Don’t go at peak hours. The service is better if you go after the lunch rush, or before/​after the dinner rush***

I feel like I can copy and paste most my review of Hockey Sushi into this place as they both have terrible service with terrible sushi, but I will write that even though Hockey Sushi can’t seem to get an order to your table at a reasonable time frame at least your order doesn’t get lost regularly!
I’ve been here twice and both times they had lost part (over a quarter) of our order making the wait even looooooooooonger. I don’t find any of the food items good here but I will eat the grilled meats. The sushi is ok at best and I’m being kind. I’m not an AYCE sushi fan but will go with my friends. I’ll be sure to avoid this place from now on.

*Please note that this review is written by a vegan*
My friends invited me to an all-​you-​can-​eat sushi date at 1,000 Sushi Islands on a Friday night. I was excited to try this place out, especially since I had just recently moved to Ottawa from Vancouver and had not yet eaten sushi since my arrival in the Nation’s Capital.
We arrived at the restaurant at a little past 6:30pm. From the outside, the restaurant looked like it could use some TLC, but I understand that outdoor maintenance and esthetic upkeep is not always something a restaurant owner can afford to invest in. Besides, sometimes the best restaurants are the hole-​in-​the-​wall places that look like crap from the outside. So, we went in.
The first thing I noticed upon entering is that the upkeep and cleanliness were really not up to par for me. The floor was absolutely atrocious, dirty and full of crumbs and who knows what. The sushi bar is right at the entrance, and unfortunately the whole place smelled fishy. Even if you don’t know much about sushi, most people know that if it smells fishy, it’s not fresh. The smell put me off a little, but since I’m vegan it’s not like I had to worry about eating old fish anyway.
The service was a little unfriendly, but I understand it’s an all-​you-​can-​eat restaurant, so usually the service staff is on a mission to refill orders and tables, not to stand around and talk with you. As long as you don’t expect your waitress to start explaining the menu to you, you should be satisfied with the service. The staff was pretty attentive, and as soon as we walked through the door we were seated, even if it seemed like their restaurant was full already.
The food. Oh boy. The menu offers some veggie options, but to be honest they could use a little crash course on what vegetarian means. For example, I ordered a Salad Roll, which is labeled with a leaf to indicate it’s a veg option. Great, I thought. But when the roll arrived, it had fish roe on top and prawn in the middle. My friends had already ordered enough for themselves and weren’t ready to help me eat the roll, so I had to «pull up my pants» and ask the server to bring it back to the kitchen at no extra cost. They never charged me for the roll. (Yay!) I politely told them that it was probably mislabeled on their menu and they should verify that this was in fact a veg Salad Roll. Overall I found most of the items really small, and some of them tasteless:
Tofu Roll:
Pretty small roll, but perfect size if you want a couple orders.
Deep Fried Tofu Cubes (not sure of the exact name):
Really, really bland. Pretty much deep fried watery tofu cubes with no flavour whatsoever, even if you drench them in soy sauce.
Avocado Roll:
Yum. A bit small, but then again they’re the perfect size if you want to order a ton and share with friends. That way you don’t get super full off one item.
Cucumber Roll: Yum. Same size as the avocado roll.
Hand-​Rolled Avocado and Cucumber Roll:
This little guy was yummy. The seaweed was nice and fresh and crispy as hell. Yummers. I’d order it again for sure.
Mango Roll:
This one came in with my disaster of a Salad Roll. It was marked as a veg option with the leaf on the menu. When the Mango Roll arrived, though, it contained Mayo. WTF? Seriously? Mayonnaise. Totally unnecessary. I’ve had Mango rolls before, and they never, ever contained mayo. How can you indicate that something is vegetarian on a menu, call it a mango roll, and add mayo to it!!! Grrr. This one I just left on the table when we left. I tried one piece and oh my, was it ever disgusting. Maybe it was because it was my first time eating mayo in about a year… but wow, yuk. Never again. Oh, and I recommend you don’t ever try it either. Even if you like mayo. It’s just yucky.
Eggplant Tempura:
Probably not vegan, but I figured that even muttering that word in their restaurant would get me dirty looks and a ton of confusion… so I didn’t ask. I’m a bad vegan, I know. :(The Eggplant Tempura was good, but I would have to ask if their batter/​technique is vegan next time. I’m pretty sure it’s not.
Overall I wouldn’t recommend this place. For $ 20+tax I ate shitty food in a loud and smelly restaurant, and was served food that was inaccurately advertised as vegetarian. If these things don’t bother you, by all means, try it out and make your own opinion. For me, I’ll be exploring the other sushi joints Ottawa has to offer, because I am convinced I can find better vegan sushi at a much better price.
Oh, and another thing: They DO NOT accept Interac. I really wasn’t expecting that, since they accept all credit cards, but no Interac? Come on. My friend ended up having to pay for me since I had no cash and do not carry my credit card around with me.
Happy eating!

I can’t do it again… I’m done. After my third time at this restaurant, each time with worse service than the last, I can’t go back. I’ve therefore downgraded my review from 3-​stars to 1-​star. This past time, much of our order was never brought to our table. Most concerning, we ordered one single salmon teriyaki amongst sushi for 8 people, and the salmon just never arrived. In the end, my wife just told them to cancel it. It was for my 4-​year old son who doesn’t like sushi, and he was quite upset, but got full on rice and soup. What happens? They bring it out AFTER we order dessert WITH chicken teriyaki (which we never ordered). Similar things happen regularly with the sushi orders, and the sushi is always dumped on a plate on the table, without any explanation of which sushi is which.
The decent taste of the sushi (not outstanding) just isn’t worth the awful service. I won’t be back!

This place wasn’t too bad. Especially for all you can eat, I was pretty satisfied with what we were served and the quality of it.
Although, without a doubt this place is way too slow. And usually when you’re going for ‘All-​you-​can-​eat’ you’ve starved yourself appropriately to make the most of it! That can be a painful combination.
But this place is perfect if you have a group of friends that you can spend chatting to while you’re waiting.

My brother, friend, and I had such a terrible experience here that it was actually funny. Though it had completely affordable prices and seemed to be very popular, we had terrible service and mediocre food. The waitress was sweet, but took forever to take our orders and bring them out. All the other tables seemed to be getting served before us. We spent almost two hours there, most of the time just waiting for our food and bill, which took 20 minutes alone.
The funniest part was when we all got excited when we saw deep-​fried scallops on the menu. When they finally arrived, my brother bit into one and I saw the completely confused and fairly disgusted look on his face. I couldn’t help but laugh and ask him what was wrong. It turns out that the deep-​fried «scallop» was actually a fish ball! Not at all the same flavor, texture. nothing. I’m not sure if they just got our order wrong, or if they were trying to pass off fish balls for scallops. Of course, we just found the situation humorous, but others may not take that kind of thing so lightly.

So far best consistent sushi place in Ottawa. Unlike Sushi Kan, ice cream is still included in the buffet portion. Typical sushi selection. Food and service was great and has been on a consistent basis.
My favourite… baby mushrooms wrapped in beef. I probably could eat a 100 of these lol… only available for dinner.
They have a small parking lot at the rear of the restaurant. Street parking is available. On weekends you can try and find parking at one of the near by offices which should be closed.

1. Food: Good selection of sushi, makis and sashimis. They are fresh and carefully done. The dishes are good, but not as good as the sushis.
2. Place: Clean environment. Try to get a table in the booth area. Anywhere else is very noisy. This place is always packed.
3. Service: They are nice but very distracted. Amateurs. Please verify if you got what you ordered.
4. Price: Extremely affordable. For the money you pay here you can barely have a nice hamburger in this city.
5. Verdict: This is probably the best all you can eat sushi place in Ottawa.