Yo! Sushi – Harvey Nichols Edinburgh

I used to really like coming here but I have really gone off the place. Consistently there are no veggie option. You see them go out on the belt but they are snaffled up quickly, which means my partner misses out. Last time we went there was one dish over the course of an 20 — 30 minutes other than Edamame. She normally fills up on unlimited Miso soup as we have had this experience before. However this time we couldn’t find any staff to catch there eye for a refill. From my experience the sushi was good for fast food sushi, but there were to many special dishes (£6 I think) and not enough regular menu items going out. We decided to cut our losses and head on.
Plus points
— interesting fast food option
— décor is cool
— conveyor belt food is always a plus
— in the center of town
— maki sushi and the salads are great
— interesting specials
Minus points
— Service can be slow to non existent, there are lots of staff buzzing around though
— limited options presented for veggies on the standard belt, you can order, but if your in a rush this isn’t great.
— feel like there is a hard push towards the special plates
— you get charges £1.10 I think it is for tap water
— trying to pay can take an age even when its quiet
I used to love this place but small things have changed now that have put me off.

Every since I moved jobs to an office in the East end of Edinburgh Yo! Sushi has become a staple of my Monday lunchtimes. All too often someone on my team will innocently say ‘Sushi Monday?’ out loud in the office knowing that the answer will always immediately be ‘TO YO! SUSHI’.
The blue Monday offers makes regular visits to Yo! much more affordable. They run a smaller menu on Mondays where all blue dishes are £2.50 each. Despite the reduced cost I still managed to consume about £20 worth of sushi each time we go. You can also order anything you like from the regular menu but it will cost you the usual price.
This place is sushi fast food. You sit down at the conveyor belt and you can start eating right way. It’s perfect for lunchtime as we can get in and out quickly, though you do sometimes have to queue for seats during the lunch hour rush.
It’s not gourmet and it’s never going to replace Kanpai as my favourite sushi restaurant in town, but it’s good quality, freshly prepared tasty Japanese food. Monday lunches seem so boring without it now.

Yo! Sushi may not be the best Sushi restaurant you can find — but it has a good standard, great locations across the country and is perfect for a quick healthy bite on your own — or a fun day out with a bunch of friends. I love it when I’m out in town shopping and want to eat at an odd time and want something light and fresh. The seaweed salad and cucumber maki always go down well.
When I’m with friends we end up trying at least half the menu! Even non-​sushi lovers can find something to try and still feel part of the fun.
And what I love the most is getting things that I normally wouldn’t try at home. Who wants to spend hours making sushi and end up with lots of just one or two types — when you can go to Yo! and have a great selection.
But my number 1 tip is TRY the pumpkin koroake! So creamy and sweet on the inside and cruchy on the outside — I have tried so many times to recreate these at home but just can’t manage!
Tip number 2 — Cheesecake Moschi! Get these as sooon as you sit down and let them come to room temperature. By the end of the meal they will be soft, creamy and unctuous — in fact get 2 plates — you’ll thank me for it later!

This is A-​Ok sushi. Nothing to write home about. Its appeal is in the delivery. This is the sushi boat-​style where dishes are prepared and set on colour-​coded dishes and placed on a conveyor belt to wend their way past customers who chose at their whim. I have seen this done on actual tiny boats, floating on a miniature canal in places in CA. I understand the conveyor-​belt theme is authentically Japanese. At any rate, it’s a conveyor belt at Yo! Sushi and this is not a cheap way to buy and consume sushi. I had a party of 3 and our bill came to about £70 once all the wee plates were tallied up. I ordered something hot from the kitchen directly, the katsu curry tofu, but I did not care for it. It is a curiously Japanese approach to curry in that it tastes like it came from a packet. Everything else seemed fresh and nicely presented but it’s pricey and kind of gimmicky. Plus there you are, up on the 4^th floor of Harvey Nick’s with all those old ladies and their £7,000 handbags and spoilt teenage daughters with them. There are probably better sushi places in Edin but this will do at a pinch. My own, spoilt teen loves it, of course.

As far as fast food goes, Yo! Sushi is certainly the top of the pile. It corners the market in being healthy, tasty and convenient. More so than any other fast food chain in Edinburgh.
Aesthetically, it does have a very clinical and impersonal feel to it but that is balanced out by friendly staff. Service was quick and very attentive, with made-​to-​order hot dishes even coming out within minutes.
Having become a recent convert to Japanese food, and searching for the best authentic Japanese food in town, Yo! Sushi wasn’t high on my list of priorities. But the food surprised me. I had expected something of the homogenised, beige and disappointing imitation food you get at fast food chains. What I ate was tasty, satisfying and, I’m not ashamed to say, the novelty value of eating off a conveyor belt after watching the food be prepared, is definitely enough to keep me coming back.
It’s not cheap relative to other fast food prices but then again, this isn’t your average fast food. Consider me a fan.

I love Sushi and for a chain Yo Sushi does it very well!
YO! Sushi’s food is fresh, seasonal and prepared daily by trained chefs right in front of you — they can roll pretty darn fast too. You can choose from a tasty variety of over 90 core dishes, including sashimi, maki and hand rolls through to hot staples such as Chicken Katsu Curry. Other items such as salads, tempura or desserts are also readily available.
The conveyor belts rotating with delicious offerings allow you to pick and choose colour coded dishes ranging from £1.70 to £5.00 — with all the empties simply counted up at the end of the meal for the bill. With unlimited drink (water) offers; water on tap, green tea and miso soup as well as soy sauce, wasabi and ginger in front of you when you sit down, its really easy to get eating in a hurry.
The Edinburgh one is upstairs in Harvey Nichols by the way and its Blue Monday every day for January!

This is an update — service much better this time and even the chefs are talking to me, very cool and great value on a Monday …

I’m a bit of a sushi noob. I absolutely love seafood, so I assumed sushi would be right up my street. I’ve dabbled once before but my sushi was smoked trout so it doesn’t really count.
I have always thought YO! Sushi looked cool, so we decided to try it. The staff member who served us was really lovely and took time to explain how it all worked.
I wasn’t a big fan of the food. I just felt that everything was quite bland. It annoys me to say it, and I’m gutted that I didn’t LOVE it because I really assumed I would. Cooked salmon is definitely WAY better than raw salmon.
The conveyor belt was pretty empty as well and that annoyed me — it wasn’t that busy, yet there were few dishes available and many were the same things.
I do intend to try sushi again, but I’m going to look for somewhere more authentic, I guess. I know YO! Is a chain so maybe the authenticity is lost slightly.
My sushi quest is to be continued…

I am a Sushi Fanatic!
…and normally I like the whole concept of Yo Sushi:
The friendly staff who offers help, if you feel you have no idea what you are doing; The conveyor belt, which carries all the little colourful plates with delicious pieces of foreign food and of which the colours indicate the prices that you need to pay in the end;
The selfless effort to pick up the taste you like and prefer in that particular minute; The high chairs and modern feel to this place, which by the way looks the same in all their branches;
Their various choices of Sushi and other stuff!
Having said this, on that occasion I was rather disappointed with what was on offer.
I like my Nigiri and it never came :-(Well, not the ones I was after!
Of course, their performance that day could have been based on the fact that they just trained new staff who thought of doing the same thing over and over again…
Tip: Try Yo Sushi on your way out — at Edinburgh Airport departure launch — and you won’t be disappointed! (certainly it does not mean you have to leave Edinburgh in order to get good Sushi, but in that instance, it’s recommendable)

I love a bargain me.
Yo! has a 40% off January special, so I couldn’t think of a better excuse to head for the conveyer.
It was a little busy over lunch time and we had to wait about 10 minutes for a table, we didn’t mind though as you can sit and eat straight away. The waiters seem to know that this is what the customers want as they’re around taking orders for hot food almost straight away.
Yo! turn on the light infront of you if you want to order, something I always forget to do. Don’t make that mistake, as I once waited almost 20 minutes for a waiter to walk by, getting increasingly annoyed and then more so when I realised it was my own stupidity.
Food wise, it’s nice, not the best sushi I’ve had. The salmon was a little tasteless which required more soya to get it going and as Jenny said below the Katsu a little meh.
I really can’t get over the novelty of the conveyer though, and I keep wondering if the two second rule counts here as well. Take it off the belt, examine it for 2 seconds and return if you don’t like it. yea yea I know, gross, but hey I left the lid on ok?! :)
Prices are a little steep for my liking, I had 5 plates and paid £10 (water costs £1!) but that’s with the discount. Full price would have been too steep for what you get.
So to sum up, good if you want a tasty quick bite with no fuss, but hunt around for a voucher. You get them when you’re on the mailing list, and when it’s YO Birthday.

The food is not good. That is the bottom line. You are going to Yo! Sushi for the experience of eating food off conveyor belts or because you happen to be in Harvey Nics and are overcome with hunger. If you actually like Japanese food, or have a desire to eat something of quality, don’t bother with this place.
Overall, we said: «What Yo! Sushi delivers is a quick and somewhat convenient way to put food in your face in the middle of a department store. And the food is on conveyor belts. If this sounds like fun, and it’s certainly worth trying once to see if it floats your boat, then go for it. Far be it from me to deny you your fun. If you want to eat good quality dishes, freshly prepared to a high standard, go elsewhere.»

I really wanted to dislike this place with it being a mass produced chain of averageness but mid shopping it actually hit the spot perfectly.
I ahte the Katsu curry which was as decent as ive had in the city elsewhere and the miso soup which also hit the spot.
Its never going to be wow but it sure is A-​ok!!!

Ok… what??? An average of around 4 or 5 stars, for a Yo Sushi?! You have got to be kidding me.
Right, here is my main issues laid out bare. That food that circulates round on the little conveyor could have been sitting there for goodness knows HOW long?! A proper Sushi joint… made to order, oh and eh… fresh. I quite quickly got past the novelty of watching all the different food go round and round as soon as I tried it. I don’t think I have really had a plate here that actually had alot of flavour to it.
It is also pretty pricey, and walking through Harvey Nic’s just to get to it makes me feel as small as humanly possible, as all those draped in Gucci and Prada strut their stuff about like it matters.
So basically, I am not a fan. The staff, I can’t really comment, it’s not like they really do alot, you pick the plates up yourself?! The price, totally not worth it. The surroundings, pretentious and not my cup of tea and most importantly the sushi — not great.

Being a sushi-​train addict in other parts of the globe, I was looking forward to my first Yo Sushi experience… and I wasn’t disappointed! The menu was a bit more complex than other places I have been, however, which made it interesting — trying to identify what things were before taking them off the conveyor belt became a challenge of multi-​tasking.
It did, though, make it a lot like my first ever sushi experience. A friend who had spent time in Japan with his girlfriend took me in and said that I wasn’t allowed to look at the menu, that he would be paying, and I should take everything that looked interesting and just not eat anything that I didn’t like the taste of after I’d tried it.
Which, I have to say, is a brilliant dining experience if you like finding new tastes! I would never, for example, have known I love — LOVE — grilled eel if it weren’t for this experience (for which I will forever be grateful!).
So, having that experience under my belt (or in my belt, as the case the may be), I decided to apply a similar fun spirit to fishing coloured plates off the conveyor belt at Yo Sushi.
The format is similar to other conveyor-​belt sushi places, with the coloured plates telling you how much each dish is, refillable green tea (the first cup isn’t complimentary as it is in some other places, but they do have unlimited refills), and a wide variety of sushi-​style dishes.
My friend recommended the scallops which I eventually tried and they were good but there were three enormous ones on the plate, which felt like a huge portion after some tuna maki. The tuna maki, I have to say, was incredible — at first, I didn’t think it was tuna, it was so light, but it was fantastic. Go easy on the chilli sauce that comes with it, though — I found this slightly overpowering but, if you avoid most of it, it gave a piquant hit to the tuna. Tasty maki (ng)!
Overall, it would have been an expensive night without the 40% January discount, however, it was a good quality of food and a fun night, so well worth it.

This place is the place to come to for a different dining experience. I came here for lunch and had a good time. Me, being indecisive had such a fun time watching the food go past me. «ouu, whats that. oh no wait! that one! no. oh damn. can’t decide.»
The service was quick, wasn’t the cleanest surfaces though. Lots of leftovers from the previous customers hanging around the bar. Must have been because it was busy though.
I’ve had better sushi. But to be fair it was still really fun and tasty. I would definitely do it again. I say give it a go!
I think i had a salt overload though somehow from my soup. I felt a little out of it and tired after leaving!

I wouldn’t consider myself a sushi snob, but I do LOVE sushi. In Edinburgh, this is my favorite place to go. It’s a bit silly and a bit forcefully trendy, but it is delicious and I like it! You pick up plates as they move by on a conveyor belt and are charged at the end by color and quantity of plates. The menus have a guide so you know how much you’re spending. Or if you’re like me, you grab plates at will and are always surprised by your bill at the end of the meal.
To order hot food or special rolls, you press a button that makes lights flash and Japanese recordings start playing. Occasionally, hot dishes like gyoza and shrimp tempura will glide by on the conveyor, but your best bet is to just ask. If you’re into mostly nigiri and sashimi, there will be plenty on the belt in front of you.
The location in Harvey Nichols is pretty cool, but can be a bit creepy if Yo! Sushi is the only thing open. I once went around 7 o’clock on a Wednesday and felt like I was in a ghost town. After store hours, you need to take the special elevator on the North side of the building. The conveyor selection is also more underwhelming on slow nights, so make reservations for Fridays or the weekends.
The website has tons of deals if you sign up to clubs or go on certain nights (they change often). If you can, sit in the back. It seems like that’s where the chefs tend to put out the new things and you can grab them before anyone else has the chance!

Whether it is genuine sushi or not (something I know some people will judge this place by) it is still very tasty, and the novetly factor has yet to wear off on me. Although, in fairness, I don’t think it is going for «authentic» considering the name and non-​Japanese like décor etc.
Anyway. I digress. The food. I met an old friend here for an after-​work dinner, and it was perfect for such an occasion. Despite being the second late-​night Thursday shopping before Christmas it wasn’t too busy, we got a table straight away (or rather a place at the large table) and could immediately begin eating. MELIKEY. I was starving, and the option to just grab something and begin noming really hit the spot.
There are quite a few things on the conveyor belt, but you need to order the hot dishes. The waiter came over promptly, however, and the food was pretty quick too. They also do the «specials» at this particular branch, which are only available at about 4 in the UK, so that was quite exciting.
I had, and can highly recommend, the aubergine, spicy chicken salad, vegetable gyoza. The duck gyoza was perhaps a little underwhelming. The katsu curry (my friend had) a bit ‘meh’. But the chicken ISO rolls were also delicious.
The only danger with this place is the food is constantly in front ofyou, and there are pretty much constant new things so our conversation was interjected with «oooo that looks amazing! NOM!» And I left feeling a tad full. Also it was a bit more expensive than I’d hoped, but that’s no one’s fault but my own as I didn’t count the coloured plates as I was going… Another great concept.
This is now going to be one of my favourite lunch and dinner spots either when I’m going solo or with a friend, in town. It’s quick, convenient, tasty, and novel. Go Yo!

Let down by the lack of atmosphere even at nighttime as you can’t get away from the fact that you’re in a department store for your dinner + they seem to have got rid of the little robots that used to wander about the floor when the central Edinburgh site was in Rose Street.
The above aside the dining experience was as pleasant as I’ve experienced in the past and the range of dishes has definitely increased in the last few years. Staff were courteous and chatty and there was very little delay between asking for a specific dish to be made and it appearing before us. Taking advantage of the unlimited miso soup and having just a couple of plates of sushi could see you fill up well for very little. Definitely somewhere else on the list of revisits.

Located in Harvey Nichols, this is a very small branch of Yo Sushi indeed, but is nonetheless super tasty. I’m glad to see that this place has plenty of good reviews as I find that Yo Sushi tends to get a slating for being too cool and not as authentic as other sushi restaurants. I’ve never been to Japan but am hopefully moving there next year where I will finally be able to see what’s authentic and what’s not but I do know that pretty much every sushi restaurant outside Japan is in some way tailored to suit the tastes of the country it finds itself in so I don’t get why Yo Sushi gets such a hard time. Plus, they have a much more extensive menu than other sushi places including sesame seed seaweed and my favourite Dorayaki pancakes that I’ve never ever found in any other Japanese restaurant in Scotland.
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Welcome back Yo! I’ve missed you so much that my eyes have been hurting from all the crying and the rocking but you’re back with your clever ways to make you spend lots of money and feel really modern cosmopolitan.
I went to Yo Sushi in London and I felt like I was the best person in the world and I know that hundreds of thousands of pounds have been spent to make you feel this way but doesn’t make the experience any less REAL.