Shinju Sushi 1375 East 53rd Street, Chicago, IL 60615

"Ordered carryout from here. I got the sushi platter to share. The food tasted great. I think everything was pretty good quality. I was disappointed that the items in my sushi platter were quite a bit smaller than I expected. They looked bigger in the menu picture, but maybe the mistake was mine. Regardless, the food was ready on time and the prices are pretty reasonable. This is the best sushi I've had so far in the Hyde Park area, so I will probably come back in the future."

"Just got to Chicago and found this place while driving. Some of the best sushi I’ve had. It’s narrow but that’s how these restaurants are in the city. Really enjoyed the food."

"First time coming here. The food was relatively decent. I would say it is pretty good for the price. However I am not sure how I feel about the disposable plates and carry out. I ordered hot miso soup in a styrofoam white bowl I don’t even think it’s safe! However the price is very good for the location. The service could’ve been better. I didn’t really like how they were not very welcoming at first but it got better. Welp they lost more tip money. Also if you pay cash they give you 10% discount. Will I be back? NO. I would rather pay little bit more for better service and quality. However when you are in budget. Why not :)"

"Trash. Skip. Do not come here. Sushi sucked. Service sucked even more. More details below if you want to read my rant: Saw people recommend this place as a cheap AYCE sushi joint so I decided to try it out. People said it gets busy quick so try to come right when they open so we did. Had a party of 6, but only 4 out of the 6 people were there when they opened. We were the first AND only people there, but the staff told us we had to wait until our entire party arrived in order for us to be seated. Soooo the 4 of us waited….in their small front area by the hostess stand….which was one small freaking bench….I understand if it was busy or they had reservations to accommodate, but like I said, we were the FIRST and ONLYYYYY people in that place. What made it even more laughable is that they put 6 glasses of water at a table which I knew was for us, but they still didn’t let us 4 people sit there while the other 2 people were on the way. They legit made us wait at the entrance while our water was getting warmer, and you can see the condensation dripping down the cups as the ice melted. Ridiculous. So by the time we got seated, you want me to drink this water that’s been chilling out here which now is at room temp, and there’s water all over the table form the condensation? Cool. Once we were seated because our entire party was there, I wanted to do the dinner AYCE menu because they had items on there I wanted that was not available on the lunch AYCE menu. I’m not from the area so I don’t know if it’s a thing in Chicago or maybe it’s just their thing, but they did not allow me to do the dinner option while everyone else did lunch. They said it was all or none AKA everyone has to do the dinner menu if I wanted to do it. I couldn’t do it alone. WHATTTTT???!!! I never heard of that, and I ask to do the dinner menu option a lot at other places with ZERO issues so this is a first for me. The staff couldn’t even explain to me why this was a rule. They just kept saying everyone has to do dinner if I want to do it and that I couldn’t be the only one doing it while everyone else had the lunch option. My friends and I assume they must have had incidents before where someone did the dinner option while others did lunch but ate the dinner menu from that person so now they are more skeptical. If that’s the case, explain the reasoning behind it. Don’t just tell me “if you want dinner, everyone has to have dinner” without trying to talk to me especially after I was trying to converse with you and reach an understanding. So heads up about that. Want to know the cherry on top? The sushi was trash. I didn’t even finish it. Too much rice. Mediocre. Now I see why it’s cheap. Because it’s cheap sushi. The only thing I did like was that the waitress said I would not get charge for my leftovers. I was going to take it to-go and pay the fee for having leftovers for the AYCE option, but when she said I wouldn’t have to pay, I said “I do not want this at all” soooo quick! This is the first place I’ve gone to where they do not charge you for leftovers if you did the AYCE so that was interesting, but what else was interesting is how they served their food in paper bowls and plates. My friend ordered ramen, and it was in a paper bowl. I’m pretty sure you guys have used paper straws for your beverages. Overtime, the paper straw slowly gets deteriorated because it’s been in your beverage for too long. Imagine my friend’s paper bowl from her ramen…..it was slowly deteriorating from the broth of her ramen! Like hello…? Why would you serve HOT broth in a paper bowl?? Make it make sense. Even the eel and soy sauces, seaweed salad, water cups, etc. were in to-go-like containers. The plastic clear containers….maybe it’s because they transitioned it during Covid and never went back to regular silverware? I don’t know their reasonings, but all I know is I’ll never return and will never recommend this place to anyone. If I see someone talk about this place, I’m going to show them this review, and hope they know better than to ever spend a dime here. Rant over"