Taipei Japanese Restaurant – “Bigger Than Your Face” Luxury Seafood Chirashi Sushi!

Text and Photos byAhmon

I’ve heard about Taipei’s Tong Sushi, a Japanese restaurant, a few years back. I was told their seafood is incredibly fresh, which instantly landed it on my must-try list as a seafood enthusiast. But I never got the chance to visit. So this time before heading to Taipei, I specifically made plans with friends to check it out and see just how good Tong Sushi really is.

Tong Sushi is located in New Taipei City’s Shin Kong Mitsukoshi A9 Building in the Xinyi shopping district. The closest MRT stations are Taipei 101 or Taipei City Hall — either way, you’ll take the elevator up to the 6th floor and walk to the end to find it. From the outside, it appears to be a modest Japanese eatery. Just let the staff know your reservation name at the entrance and they’ll guide you to your seat.

The restaurant is situated in a corner spot on its floor, featuring an interior design of sleek black tones that give off an elegant and refined vibe — reminiscent of a high-end Japanese kaiseki restaurant. The lighting is bright and refreshing, and seating by the window offers views of the bustling Xinyi District. In the evening, it transforms into a fine dining spot with a view, letting you enjoy the beautiful night scenery. Whether you dine here during the day or at night, there’s a unique charm. The tables are spaced apart, offering diners a good degree of privacy — quite commendable for a space in pricey Xinyi.

If you’d prefer more privacy for conversation, there are also a few small private rooms available for reservation.

Upon being seated, the staff serves hot barley tea, which is quite tasty. It’s refillable for free, so you might not even need to order a drink. Of course, you can also order beverages separately or choose from a decent selection of alcoholic drinks if you’re in the mood.

The menu at Tong Sushi looks rather thin at first glance, but when we opened it, we were truly surprised. Wow — there are just so many dishes listed per page, way more than expected. It’s almost overwhelming, so if you’re unsure what to get, you can always ask the staff for recommendations.

After browsing the menu for a while, we finally decided to go for this incredibly generous set meal combo, which included a mixed seafood hot pot and a luxurious seasonal chirashi sushi. That’s…<饭和火锅都吃的到，分量适合3~4人一起吃，也比起分开单点也便宜不少呢。

For smaller groups, there are also double combos available, giving you plenty of options regardless of party size.

The sushi here uses premium ingredients, which is reflected in the slightly higher prices — they even have truffle beef and tuna belly (otoro)! It’s mouthwatering just thinking about it.

Starters and sashimi — if I weren’t worried about not finishing the set, I would’ve loved to try their deluxe sashimi platter. The photo alone looked insanely tempting.

Steamed dishes, hand rolls, and clear soups.

Stir-fried, grilled, and fried items.

Vegetarian selections — I thought I was seeing things when I flipped to this page. A Japanese restaurant actually has a vegetarian menu? This place is really thoughtful, designing special vegetarian dishes for plant-based diners. Thumbs up!

Hot pots — if you’re visiting on a cold day and craving a hot pot, they offer seafood and pork hot pots. The broths include Japanese kelp and Ishikari miso flavors.

N<饭，日本料理中不可缺少的海鲜N<饭也有，因为是极奢系列，所以食材都用很顶级，松茸、松露、鲍鱼都用上去了，所以价格是走高单价，但菜单图片看起来都好好吃(猛流口水)。

Pickled tomato in sake lees — after ordering, the staff served two complimentary appetizers. The first was pickled tomato in sake lees. The tomatoes are peeled and marinated in red wine, giving them a subtle wine aroma with a sweet and tangy flavor. They’re also chilled, making them refreshingly cool and perfect for hot days. We polished them off in seconds, XD.

Yuzu-marinated radish — another complimentary appetizer. It’s one of my favorite side dishes at Japanese restaurants since each place makes it differently. Tong Sushi uses yuzu for pickling, giving it a refreshing citrus aroma, plus a crisp, juicy texture that’s quite appetizing. It’s so good you just keep eating one after another.

Luxurious seasonal chirashi sushi — when we first ordered this combo, we wondered just how “luxurious” it would be. But when the server brought out a bowl bigger than a human face, our jaws nearly dropped. My goodness!! This is the biggest chirashi sushi I’ve ever seen in my life. No wonder it’s meant for 3–4 people — if two people were to share it, they’d probably be full right away.

And then there’s the seafood — it’s seriously over the top. Unlike other chirashi sushi, most of the ingredients here are lightly torched, giving off a rich aroma. There’s torched halibut fin, scallops, salmon, and spaghetti eel, along with horsehair crab roe, shredded crab meat, salmon roe, and Japanese codfish flakes. These toppings almost completely cover the vinegar rice beneath — it’s truly luxurious and extravagant, living up to its price tag.

Horsehair crab roe with torched halibut — the incredibly pricey horsehair crab roe is piled generously atop the rice, as if it’s free. Paired with delicious torched halibut fin, the double-texture melt-in-your-mouth experience is enhanced by a double dose of sweetness. The vinegar rice has the perfect level of acidity — it stimulates the appetite without overpowering the seafood flavors. It’s so good you just can’t stop eating. No exaggeration.

Torched scallops — the torching process gives the scallops added layers of flavor, with a delicate smoky aroma that’s super enticing. Combined with a generous serving of salmon roe, torched salmon, and other seafood, every bite feels like pure happiness. It’s absolutely flawless. We devoured it in no time like autumn leaves swept away by the wind, still wanting more. Eating the horsehair crab roe, scallops, and salmon roe together is such a luxurious and flavorful experience.

Mixed Seafood Hot Pot — While we were halfway through the chirashi sushi, the server brought out the star of the meal: the seafood hot pot. Huh? Why is there no seafood in the pot? Just vegetables and konjac? Where’s the seafood? Don’t worry — the seafood comes on a separate plate. The pot itself is already packed with various mushrooms, tofu, and meatballs, making it super filling. This portion is definitely enough for four people. The broth is Japanese kelp-based, resulting in a light and refreshing taste — perfect even for summer. As the pot heats up, the flavor gets better and better over time.

Seafood Platter — shortly after the hot pot came this super extravagant seafood platter. The center piece is a massive pike conger eel. There’s also red shrimp, raw scallops, squid, sea bass, and big clams — so much seafood it’s almost unbelievable. Where do you even start? To keep the seafood fresh, the bottom of the platter is layered with lots of ice, but it’s best to cook it ASAP.

This small dish is the dipping sauce for the hot pot. I think it’s some kind of fruit vinegar, but we ended up not using it much because the seafood here is so fresh that it tastes sweet and delicious on its own. So we forgot all about the sauce. Honestly, eating seafood as-is is the way to go.

Pike conger eel — the most eye-catching item on the seafood platter is this huge pike conger. When you crack open the shell, the generous amount of roe inside is a delightful surprise. This eel is just amazing. We recommend saving it for last because once it goes into the pot, the broth takes on a rich crab roe flavor — a totally different taste. For easy eating, the eel is pre-cut, and once cooked, you can use special crab utensils to extract the meat. The fresh crab is incredibly sweet and delicious — highly recommended.

Sea bass — sea bass is nutritious and great for making fish soup. The skin-on fillet has delicate flesh and a delicious flavor, which we really enjoyed.

Clams — these clams are huge, even larger than 50 NT coins. Being a frequent clam eater, I could tell just by looking that they’re probably not cheap, but they must be super plump. That made me even more excited, XD.

Soft squid is one of the seafood dishes loved by Taiwanese, but I can’t really tell the difference between squid, cuttlefish, and small squid. Fortunately, the friendly waiter helped explain, or I might have thought I was eating small squid XD. For convenience, the squid has already been pre-cut into pieces. Just drop them into the pot and once they change color, they’re ready to be scooped out. Be careful not to overcook them.

Raw scallops — there were four scallop slices, seemingly each cut from one whole scallop. They felt quite fresh. At first, I wanted to try them raw, but since they were placed with other seafood, I decided to cook them in the end.

Angel red shrimp — this angel red shrimp is also a major highlight of the seafood platter. The super large angel red shrimp caught my friend’s eye as soon as it was served, making it hard to ignore. There were four big ones in total, one per person just right.

Since the shrimp were so tempting, we started with them. The angel red shrimp are naturally red, so even after being cooked in the pot, it’s not easy to tell if they’re done just by the color. Instead, you can check if the meat inside the shell has slightly shrunk. Fresh shrimp shells are easy to peel, and ours came off effortlessly — a gentle tug and the shells all came off XD. The texture was firm and bouncy, and the sweet, fresh flavor had us raving. It was just as good as the king prawns, highly recommended.

As for hot pot sides, in addition to the ingredients already in the pot and the luxurious seafood platter, there was also a portion of fresh vegetables. These vegetables were served on a separate wooden tray, allowing guests to decide when to put them in. Today’s vegetable was bok choy.

Once the hot pot was boiling, we didn’t hesitate to toss in all the bok choy. The more vegetables in the pot, the better the broth tastes. But don’t cook the bok choy too long, or the texture will be ruined XD.

After finishing the shrimp, next came the scallops and large clams. The scallops only needed a few seconds in the pot until they turned white, then they were ready to eat. Don’t overcook them, or all the essence will seep into the broth, and the texture will become tough. Scallops are best when they’re tender and burst with sweet juice when bitten into. The clams were very fresh — they opened up within seconds of hitting the pot. Look at these plump, juicy clam meats — biting into them gave a full taste of the sea, creating a wonderful sense of happiness. We quickly tossed the rest in and polished them all off.

Cuttlefish and crab roe dumplings — the cuttlefish was also pretty fresh, with no off-putting taste. The texture had a bit of chew, and after chewing a few times, I suddenly craved a bottle of draft beer XDDD. I initially thought the crab roe dumplings were just regular meatballs, but when I bit into one, I noticed a different texture and realized they actually had filling inside — what a pleasant surprise. Upon closer inspection, it turned out to be crab roe. The outer layer of the dumpling was Q弹 (chewy and bouncy), while the filling had a granular texture, combining for a multi-layered and delicious bite. Although I’m not usually a fan of meatball-type ingredients, I really liked the way these were made. Can I order an extra portion, please? XDD?

When we finished eating and were leaving the restaurant, we saw the kitchen counter just serving out a plate of N<饭，看到那如山高的炙烧干贝，然后想到刚刚吃的干贝是多么的甜美嫩口，肚子好像就又有点饿了，只好再找时间来品尝看看了。

Overall, even though we only had two main dishes and two side dishes today, we could fully appreciate the restaurant’s dedication to ingredient quality. The seafood was fresh and delicious, so you definitely get what you pay for. Price-wise, it’s really not expensive either. I recommend this Tong Sushi to friends who love seafood and Japanese cuisine. The above is just my personal opinion for reference.

Tong Sushi
Phone: 02-27205200
Address: 6F, No. 9, Songshou Rd., Xinyi District, Taipei City (inside Shin Kong Mitsukoshi A9)
Price: À la carte and various set meals, plus 10% service charge

Ah Mon’s Taiwan Adventures ~ Food, Travel, Photography, Outdoor Shooting
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