Japanese Restaurant Shiki

Kalverstraat — the cluster-​F street for shopping in Amsterdam where crossing the white water rapids of people and baby strollers makes entering a store on the other side as labourious as finding a room to try on the five items for which you spend the last 30 minutes looking. Needless to say, if I have to tread into this treacherous river of fashion-​hungry humans, I will do my business and make a hasty escape by whatever means necessary. Lucky for me, the street designers of Amsterdam have carefully placed alleys (Steegjes) to handle overflow. In such an alley on one fateful day after buying essentials at Blokker, did I venture in and find Shiki…
Shiki is a poetic word in Japanese meaning the four seasons and while I’m sure this establishment is open year-​round, I think my first visit will be the last. I thought the place was clean, staff was friendly and there are nice tables to watch tourists browsing marijuana paraphernalia and trying harring for the first time in the small Dutch restaurant across the alley. However, the food was not my cup of tea. They do have traditional Japanese dishes like unagi-​don, ramen, katsu-​don, etc… but it just wasn’t good for me.
We tried the 野菜炒め (pan fried veggies) ラーメン (ramen) 天ぷらミックス (Tempura mix) and for me they weren’t bad, but not all together good either. The Ramen kind of looked like Tonkotsu Ramen (a western Japanese style using pig bones) but was kind of bland. The pan friend veggies also had little flavor and the tempura… well it’s fried so you can’t really go wrong here! I will have to say that for people that aren’t Japanese themselves, they’ve created a close-​to-​Japanese menu, but that’s pretty much it.
If I find myself escaping the wild currents of Kalverstraat into this small little alley where Shiki is and also starving to the point I can’t walk 5 minutes to get home and I’m with someone who wants to eat here, I’m not opposed to the idea. But I won’t be recommending it either.

Do you like sushi? Do you like smelling pot smoke? Then why not come here and get sushi while smelling pot smoke?
I got their 18 piece sushi deal for 9.99 euros, and it was pretty good. The catch is you can’t eat it in the restaurant, you can only take it to go. But that wasn’t a problem for me because I went to Dam Square a short walk away and sat on a bench and people watched while eating my meal. While waiting for them to make the sushi you can enjoy their free wi-​fi and inhale the second hand pot smoke from the coffee shops up and down the street.
I did think it was weird it was a Japanese restaurant run by women speaking Chinese, but they didn’t hassle me, so I didn’t share the negative experiences of the other Unilocal reviewers here. 18 pieces of sushi for 10 euros is a good deal!

We stopped by here on our first night in Amsterdam and we were tired and hungry. The place was completely empty at around 8PM, but we thought maybe everyone likes to eat early in the city… right, that’s it… When I fired up my Unilocal app, I saw the questionable number of stars with a limited number of reviews, but we decided to give it a try anyway and maybe find a diamond in the rough.
The little number of Unilocalers that reviewed the place were not lying though. The food here was not good at all. I ordered the beef ramen and it really tasted like the ramen I would have made back in college… Maybe with a few extra helpings in the soup. We ordered a chicken teriyaki appetizer and I swear I heard the beeps of the microwave shortly before they brought out. Though the two women that worked there or who owned the place were very nice and attentive.
At the end of the night, there was sushi left over that barely resembled anything we’ve eaten before and there were no takers, not because we weren’t hungry, but no one wanted to risk it.