It's been 4 years or so I haven't been back ...Tonight I came on a Friday night around 7:30pm for dinner. Everything to me " personally " was just ok .... The restaurant cleanliness is good ! Plenty of seating ... I do know that they also have a Ybor location, but this is the only location that I prefer. read more

See all

I came here with my significant other on a Sunday. He had the shoyu ramen and the dragon roll. I had the sushi bowl (I forgot the name). It was ok! The actual place was beautiful and super romantic. I loved the ambience and thought the food versus space was very nice. The waitress was very nice and helpful. She was present but not overbearing and I enjoyed the experience! read more

Pros: Large, beautiful dining area with a tan/blue color scheme. There is a glass case on one end and the sushi bar is parallel to the main dining area. There are vaulted ceilings which are relatively rare for a sushi restaurant. Most sushi places are cozy or medium sized. Great customer service. My server refilled drinks quickly and efficiently. She checked on me just the right amount. Very nice presentation of the rolls. Each was on a large separate plate which is unusual in my experience. The fish and Ingredients was fresh and tasty. Crispy rice spicy tuna was an interesting idea that skirts the idea of traditional sushi. Open Sundays! Cons: Most of the rolls are between $10 to $16. It is a bit more pricy than the average Tampa sushi restaurant. The toilet in the men's room wouldn't flush. Overall: A very good sushi joint in Carrolwood and good place for date night read more

See all

It was not busy on a Monday night. The place was clean and decorated very nicely. They have many tables, a sushi bar and a regular bar. Service was good and no problem getting a table. I had the Tokyo roll, Eel roll and the Rainbow roll. All were very good and fresh. Definitely a cool place and convenient right on N. Dale Mabry. read more

See all

Is the best sushi I've ever had! So fresh and tasty . My favorite is the Hawaiian roll bc it has coconut shrimp and the tempura lobster roll but everything on the menu is really good . read more

SPONTANEOUS COMBUSTION!!! TO DIE FOR!! VOLCANO ROLL ALSO A1, their crab rangoons are also to die for. Very good drinks and the ambiance is great. Only downside is the wait times read more

Our friends recommended this spot for sushi, so we wanted to give it a try. It was very good and did not disappoint! Service was great, the server was very friendly and patient. The menu is pretty large, so there is something for everyone. The sushi is pretty average priced compared to everything else in the area. There were no complaints are our table, everything was delicious and extremely filling. They also have a full bar menu with some tasty drinks. The sangria was amazing and in a very large glass! We have ordered take out as well and were also very pleased with our order. It was packaged well, still fresh, and included everything we asked for. The only thing I would not order again is the crab Rangoons. Although they were tasty, there was not much filling in them and they were pretty soft. Other than that, I have no complaints and will definitely be returning! read more

See all

How ever many years ago when this location opened, there was reason for excitement. The location in Ybor was great. Started out that way. Now the menu is stale, the service is average on a good day, and if you order take out, triple the time you're quoted and it might be ready by then. Hoping they're able to figure it out, but not optimistic. read more

Samurai Blue in Carrollwood has become my go-to neighborhood sushi spot! Their sushi lunch special is a great deal--just $15 for two rolls plus your choice of soup or salad. I ordered two Florida rolls with a salad, and also added the gyoza and tempura ebi appetizers. Everything was fresh, flavorful, and beautifully presented. I went with a few coworkers, and everyone at the table enjoyed their meals. The service was friendly, and the atmosphere was relaxed--perfect for a casual lunch outing. We all agreed we'll definitely be back! read more

See all

A lot of bad energy in that place. The food is also disgusting. The servers/ host farts a lot. Honestly surprised that they are still open for business. read more

Ordered takeout and it was quite average. Got a crunchy spicy tuna roll and the Mexican roll. We unfortunately got the wrong sushi roll in our order instead of tuna, but didn't realize till we got home. The sushi was also warm so the fish didn't taste as fresh. The crab wontons were good - but overall we would try another sushi restaurant in the area. Or we'd say try to eat-in instead of takeout. read more

The experience was bad so I have little to say. The pictures speak for themselves. I got 2 of the most expensive rolls. I spent $30 on what you see below. Both were to go. One was the size of a roll of nickels and when I got home looked disgusting and did not taste much better. The other a bit larger and tasted better than the first but mediocre at best. I hate to judge a place on just one visit but that is the case. I have no intention of returning to confirm what I experienced. Too many good places out there. read more

Samurai Blue - Osaka-Hako - Sushi Bars Near Me - Tampa, Florida

See all

I thought the food was hot and fresh. Sushi was good. I also got a miso soup and gyoza, all good. Restaurant looked really clean.

The Hamachi Kama was probably one of the best I've ever had. Nigiri was decent but rice could have been seasoned a little bit better. If I can give a 4.5, I would. read more

Ambiance was calm and peaceful and the tuna nigiri was delicious and fresh paired well with a seaweed salad. We were able to find bar seats pretty quickly and the service was great. read more

Went here for dinner with my wife after a hard work day. We have struggled to find a great sushi place. We had passed this place several times but this was our first time stepping inside. The atmosphere here is relaxed and casual and when we enter we were met by the host who immediately sat us at a booth where we were immediately greeted by our server Gabriella. We made our order and waited. The wait was reasonable and not a problem since the saki was flowing and very tasty. When the food arrived we were pleasantly surprised by the portion size, freshness, and overall flavor. I have had sushi all over the world and when I say this place was amazing I can't express just how much we enjoyed it. My sashimi platter came with a Ginger salad and a Miso soup. The wife got a few rolls and we both were very pleased with our meal. I requested the manager stop our table so I could tell him how happy we were with the meal. I also had to stop by the sushi preparation counter and thank the men that had created our dinner. We certainly will be back next time we are in the mood for amazing Sushi and Sashimi. read more

See all

We have been wanted to check this place out. Came here the other night for dinner. It's a cute little place. The service was quick.

Samurai Blue is a cute little restaurant presented with nice decor for indoor Tampa dining. Atmosphere is casual so you don't have to get super dressed for a date night. Cocktails were good. Service was good. The only thing we had that had us shook was the tuna crispy rice. Absolutely love this dish and probably could have had more plates. The rest of the food was satisfactory. I say satisfactory and not good for a couple of reasons: the Crab Rangoon was extremely cream cheese forward with little crab meat and a light fry on the wontons. The rolls, while beautifully presented were extremely sauce-forward. If you love sauce then this is the place for you! However for us, the sauce took away our ability to enjoy the differences between different rolls. They all ended up tasting very much the same. If anything I would ask for a light sauce or sauce on the side so that you can fully appreciate more of the roll itself. I was surprised to see uni on the menu, enjoyed 2/3 pieces but the third was quite bitter. Sadly I don't know if we will be back unless it's just for the Tuna Crispy Rice, as there are many other sushi rolls elsewhere that excelled when we made comparisons. Solidly a 3/5 but I really hope this restaurant adjusts to improve what they have: it's a nice little spot! read more

See all

Food was very good here. Great variety and they even have alcohol, instead of just beer and sake. It did take a while to get the food, but when it came it was very tasty read more

We didn't had sushi for a long time so on Wednesday night we decided to have sushi for dinner. We decided to have dinner at Samurai Blue since the reviews were good and place also seemed well. Accessibility and Restaurant Samurai Blue was around 20 minutes from our place plus there was ample of parking space available. When we entered the restaurant the restaurant was nice and clean with ample of seating opportunities available. The restaurant was beautifully decorated and it had a nice decor. Being a weekday night there weren't much people in the restaurant. Food and Service Once we sat down for food we were greeted by our server Soomi along with the menus. We got the water soon.. By exploring the menus we started our order with appetizer Miso Grilled Corn and for sushi we ordered Red Devil Sushi and Hawaiian Roll along with Spicy Mayo as well as Garlic and Wasabi. We soon got started with sushis along with the appetizers. The sushi's as well as appetizers were delicious and tasty. Amazing sushi to try at Samurai Blue. Amazing restaurant with delicious food. read more

See all

The inside was clean, very quiet and calm atmosphere. Service was great, my waiter Joe was attentive and kind. The furikake salmon and Gyoza's were delicious. Geisha roll was as decent well. Would definitely return. read more

Sushi is so good every single time. Server was attentive and polite. The vibe is relaxed and chill. read more

See all

Food is always good. I rented the private room once for a party and it was great. Food came out quick and our server was awesome.

I was craving sushi and found this place and saw it has good reviews so decided to give it a day. It was super good! I had their Kyoto roll and it was delicious. I called them and by the time I got there it was ready. I would definitely try more of their roles in the future. Highly recommend it read more

Samurai Blue - Kyoto roll! Delicious - Sushi Bars Near Me - Tampa, Florida

We had 7 sushi rolls. All delicious. Cucumber wrapped roll, volcano, soft shell crab, blue moon with crab was our favorite!Crab Rangoon was small but good. Service was good. We will definitely go back. Very close to Sidesplitters comedy. read more

Just came back from dinner with my boyfriend. We wanted to try a new sushi spot on Dale Mabry. My boyfriend has been to the original Samurai Blue in Ybor and really enjoyed the experience so we decided to check this location out. First things first. They need more staff. I understand that it's that everyone is understaffed but it was a slow Sunday night and we ended up spending almost two hours at dinner, half of the time was waiting for the food (thus the low rating). Oh and also almost no sake options. What sushi restaurant has no sake?! Anyways onto the food. The blue crab Rangoon was pretty good was overpriced considering it was mostly cream cheese in the 4 pieces that we received. It was good but kind wish it wasn't smothered in the sweet and sour sauce. Tuna tatake was pretty good. A little bit tart with the ponzu sauce but still good. I didn't get pics of my boyfriend's sushi rolls but he got the spicy tuna roll and the Love roll. He really enjoyed the Love roll. I got the spicy salmon hand roll. Kind of sucks that there's no uni because I definitely want would've gotten the uni and scallop roll. I also got the pressed sushi roll which was pretty good. All in all, it just took forever to get food. And despite it being a quiet Sunday, service was super slow. I doubt I'd be back. Sucks because food was pretty decent. read more

See all

This is the 3rd restaurant that Samurai Blue has opened in the Tampa Bay area (also in Westchase and Ybor), and I had no idea it was there until friends invited me to meet them for lunch. It's a free-standing building off of Dale Mabry, and it was easy to miss. Fortunately you can turn into the strip mall just past it, and drive through the parking lot back to their parking lot. Our waitress was efficient and friendly and in no time we had our drinks and order in to the sushi bar. We started with the blue crab rangoon, best in the area, and it did not disappoint. I love that they have a lunch special of two rolls and soup or salad for only $10. Great deal! And like all their other locations, they are very generous with the amount of actual fish in the rolls. I had the Mexican roll, with fried shrimp, and I can't remember the name of the other one, but they both were delicious. This location lives up to the SB excellence, and is definitely worth a visit. read more

Samurai Blue - Delicious lunch rolls. - Sushi Bars Near Me - Tampa, Florida

Service was ok, the food was good. We had edamame, but nobody can mess that up. The Crab Ragoons had that sweet and spicy sauce on top that was a little too much. The rolls we ordered were delicious: Tempura Lobster Roll. I'll probably go back read more

Samurai Blue - Tempura Lobster Roll - Sushi Bars Near Me - Tampa, Florida

The sushi was good, but the wait to get it was not worth it. We waited an hour and a half for our food and our waitress only came around to take out order, give us our food and our check. Giving them benefit of the doubt and saying it was busy. There interior was gorgeous though. read more

Samurai Blue - two plates of food on a table - Sushi Bars Near Me - Tampa, Florida

This hands down is my favorite sushi place. I haven't had a roll that I have not liked here! And the place is really nice and the Decour is exquisite great for a date night! But be aware on Friday and Saturday night you may be waiting a while for your food and to be seated because they get really busy. But the way is well worth it! read more

See all

This is the second restaurant they have open. The space is a lot beautiful than the YBOR location. They have a small room for hosting a special function or event. The restaurant is well decorated. I like the new space. We were here for their lunch special. Two roll with soup or salad is $11. It is a good deal. The restaurant is kind of empty. It need good promotion for the local Carrollwood to attract more customers. We got the two roll with Atlantic and Tokyo Rolls. The Atlantic roll is very nice. It is a Striped Bass with imitation crab meat and lemon slice. The lemon slice enhances the flavor. I would recommend this roll. The Tokyo roll has tuna and yellow tail mixed. The spicy sauce make it very nice. Our next dish is the baked mussels. But I like this dish better at YBOR because they bake till crisp on the top. Nonetheless, it is good big pieces of mussels. We also got the tempura bento box. The tempura is not measured up because they just dip the wet batter and fried. They did not add the tempura while fried to make it hairy. Overall is a good visit. Good service. read more

See all

Good atmosphere but ok sushi. I can't say much more than that. Overall price was average and service was good. read more

This place makes THE BEST SUSHI! The Blue Moon and Spontaneous Combustion rolls are to die for. If you love sushi, you need to check it out! Definitely one of my top 3 favorite restaurants of all time! read more

Tryed this out on a first date, and the meal was fantastic. We had a little wait and were seated. Server comes and we order drinks. She got a tea and they didn't have Splenda.(they have the pink and blue ones) i had a Knob creek and it was a good pour. Drinks come and we order food, i got the volcano roll. It's Tuna and was great with plenty of flavor. She got some sushi too not sure what it was, we were too busy talking and laughing. It took about 30 mins for the sushi to come out, but the chefs were right next to is and they were chopping their butts off. The server was kinda new and forgot to bring my date a water but other than that it was great. Like sushi? Stop by and get rid of those blues! read more

See all

In these crazy times, please go support your local restaurants! This is a fantastic place to go to, especially if you get a chance to get their lunch special! For what you're paying (a fantastically low price of $11), you get a nice filling lunch of salad, sushi roll, appetizer, and entrée! Amazing! The salad with the ginger dressing has a perfect balance of sweet, savory, and spice that wakes you up. The California Roll is solid and comes with a side of pickled cucumbers. I got the tempura combo, which comes with both shrimp and mixed vegetable tempura. The tempura is nice and light and not too overly battered like some places. The entrée also come with a side of 3 potstickers and rice. For $11, you leave feeling full and very satisfied. This place is a must go to for fast and friendly service and great value! :) read more

Samurai Blue - Fantastic food for a fantastic value! Get the lunch combo! - Sushi Bars Near Me - Tampa, Florida

So they moved from Westchase to busy Dale Mabry. Their signage is VERY DARK.. it's so dark it looks like a street light unless you were 'looking for them'. The building they built is beautiful inside. It's a very posh restaurant...but with the posh restaurant is the posh menu prices. To say they are different from another sushi place is untrue. Wish they had a happy hour or late night menu.. I'm sure in due time that will change. The food was good but again average sushi. There were lots of fun rolls but paying upwards of $12-15 for a roll just seems kind of nuts. Our waiter was very pleasant and attentive. We had the annoying kid that loved to hear his echo..luckily it was 8pm and it was pretty dead inside. Everything about the place is beautiful and clean so I'm sure they will do vvveerry well on Dale Mabry to cater to the boogie people around there. read more

Why 5 stars? Because my favorite restaurant in my neighborhood - how could it be better? --- --- --- The question, "What is your favorite restaurant" is such a tough one to answer. How can one compare a Mexican restaurant to a poke spot? Or sushi to pizza? Italian versus a burger joint? It always depends on what you're in the mood for. If you've had tacos five days in a row, chances are you aren't going to be jazzed about tacos on day number six. But when I'm asked this all-important question, I have a default answer: Samurai Blue. Why? Because the consistency is absolutely remarkable. I've been eating at the Ybor location since around the time I moved to Tampa Bay in 2007 and the sushi has been *exactly* as awesome every single time. Samurai Blue is owned by possibly the nicest two human beings on the planet - Yung and Rosa. Yung wakes up at an un-Godly hour to come into the restaurant and prepare the secret sauces for the sushi. Anytime you're up for some kind of crazy-early flight, or if you've stayed out at the bar until last call, know that at that moment, Yung is at the restaurant making sauce. That's a ridiculous amount of dedication to do that for this many years, but it's also a testament to why the product is so precisely perfect every time. I was going about my business one day, when Yelper Chris W texted me, "did you know they are building a Samurai Blue in Carrollwood?" My first instinct was to assume that he was mistaken. There's no way that could be happening without me knowing about it, right? But the next day, I specifically took a ride up Dale Mabry just so I could look for it... and sure enough... there it was, in all of its pure, unadulterated glory. A Samurai Blue less than 2 miles from my front door. How have I been so blessed?! But for folks who don't care to hear me wax poetic about my 11+ year love affair with the history of Samurai Blue and just want to know what to order: well, first off... you cannot go wrong. But don't miss out on ordering the Blue Crab Rangoon as an appetizer. It combines so many flavors together in such wonderful harmony. When I visit Samurai Blue, I'm always tempted to order a different appetizer just so I can sample something different, but I always order the crab rangoon and I never regret it. If you flip the sushi menu over to the back side, you'll notice some more expensive rolls, but I assure you, they are worth every penny. I've had almost all of them at one point over the years, but on my first visit to the Carrollwood location, I had the Tokyo Rock-n-Roll, the Blue Moon Roll and the Love Roll. My wife and I agreed that they were all amazing and that it was tough to pick a favorite from that group. My wife is not a really big sushi fan, but at one point, she said, "Oh my God, it's all so amazing," and it warmed my cold, dark heart. For dessert, we tried the vanilla and green tea mochi, which is something I'd never had at the other location. I really liked these, and I may be alone in this observation, but the vanilla mochi tasted like root beer. That's a good thing, because I love root beer. But my wife doesn't like root beer and thought I was crazy to make that comparison, so maybe my palette is just a little wonky. I can't wait until word gets out and I see this parking lot full on a regular basis. I still can't believe it's real - there's a Samurai Blue in Carrollwood. read more

See all

Pathetic excuse of a sushi restaurant. Ordered a grilled eel roll, rangoons, and teriyaki chicken. Chicken was subpar, grilled eel roll had nasty salty sauce all over, didn't have wasabi, and barely had any eel, damn thing wasn't even cut properly and was filled with cucumber and cream cheese, at some point I thought I ordered a cucumber roll. The rangoons barely had any filling? Are you joking? I was eating fried wonton wrappers soaked in oil. Yuck. Stop playing with people's money. read more

I used to like this place until they charged me an ABSURD $60 for an $8 bottle of Sake. Even at high school end sushi restaurants the EXACT same bottle of sake is NEVER more than $20. I called the manager out and said clearly this is a mistake because I've ordered the EXACT same bottle of sake there before & Was not charged anywhere even close to $60. This bottle had a manual line item entry "misc liquor $60". The manager said oh "I'm sorry this is what we charge. Nothing I can do about it". Excuse me? This is one of the most common sake's sold. And they don't have it on the menu but they absurdly price gouge accordingly, simply because it's not listed on the menu & can't do anything about it? Absurd price gouging on the sake. If they listed it on their menu they would never get away with it because no other sushi restaurant on the planet that sells that sake would dare try to sell an $8 bottle for $60 without TELLING YOU: "HEY WE PRICE GOUGE THIS ITEM ARE YOU SURE YOU STILL WANT TO PURCHASE"? First read more

Excellent food. They have a few rolls you won't find elsewhere! I highly recommend the Kyoto roll and The Blue Moon roll!