Hot Stone Steak and Sushi Bar is a Japanese restaurant that serves fresh, real Japanese wasabi & A5 Japanese Wagyu. They celebrated their first anniversary last week, and recently won a Golden Dish Award for the best sushi in London. The Head Chef Padam Raj Rai previously worked for high profile restaurants such as Nobu and Zuma and as a former head sushi chef at Tsukiji and has 17 years of experience behind him. Hot Stone is a short walk from Angel tube station, and very easy to find.

It was my sister’s birthday last week and I wanted to treat her to lunch. This was a recommendation from one of the influencer’s I follow – Known as Mike Tsang aka freshmikeeats. There were so many suggestions he mentioned but Hot Stone stood out for me. When I booked I was lucky to see on their website they are offering 25% off à la carte at lunch except for on special occasions. 

[Screenshot of Hot Stone Steak and Sushi Bar lunch deal from their website]

When we arrived the chefs and waiters greeted us with warm smiles. This is a contemporary restaurant, with a sushi bar to your left in which you can see the chefs happily working away with great dedication and ease. The restaurant itself is small- it has been decorated stylishly – blossomed origami delicately placed along the walls, wooden tables and chairs and cute cats as chop sticks holders.

Our table was at the end of the restaurant, a little area where we were slightly closed off from everyone else which was great! The menu is vast and we were excited to choose as their selection of sushi, sashimi and hot stone dishes were enticing. 

We ordered the following to share:

Grilled Mackerel – kizami oroshi with ponzu

Scallop Tataki – With truffle ponzu & plum sauce

Crunchy hot stone roll – King prawn tempura, teriyaki sauce, crunchy tempura flakes

Seared salmon sashimi – With spicy truffle yuzu miso sauce

Sushi selection 7pcs – Salmon, Tuna, Octopus, Hamachi, Scallop, Ebi, Butterfish

A pot of Premium Japanese Loose Leaf Green Tea

Every dish was tasty but my favourite was the crunchy hot stone roll – warm rice freshly made tempura with a creamy middle – avocado and crab sticks – shame they were so small, I could have easily eaten more.

Grilled Mackerel was how it should be with great flavours and taste. 

The scallop tataki was elegantly presented, in half an oyster shell. It shine brightly and was topped with floral detailing to finish the dish – it tasted just as good as it looked, fresh and it slid down our throats.

Seared salmon sashimi was delicious- we were waiting for this dish in particular, as we seem to opt for this dish everywhere we go – it was delicate and tender and melted in our mouths.

The sushi selection was beautiful to the eye and mouthwateringly good when it entered our mouths, each individual sushi was carefully handcrafted.

Hot Stone talks highly about their wasabi as it is the real deal, and takes up to 3 years to grow! I felt that the real wasabi tastes a lot better than the horseradish ones, but because I’m not a fan of spice it was still not to my liking. To me it was a subtle flavour then the fire kicks in, whereas the horseradish wasabi that most of us are use to is just fiery and doesn’t have much flavour, so if you are a fan of wasabi you should try Hot Stone’s one, I’m sure you’ll enjoy it more than me!

We accompanied this with a pot of Premium Japanese Loose Leaf Green Tea, which helped digest our food. I loved the little glazed cups that we drank from, the were so delicately painted.

This was a great experience although I did feel it was a bit pricey. Despite this is everything tasted exceptional. The staff were lovely and very attentive, I would go back again to try their hot stone dishes.

Hot Stone Steak and Sushi Bar restaurant opens from Tuesday to Friday at 5.30pm to 10pm, and the weekends 12pm to 3pm, reopens 5.30pm to 10pm and closed on Monday’s.