Pink Tuna just opened a week ago (June 2007), so we felt lucky to happen to be in the area of a brand new sushi place.
The place was filled with beautiful looking girls who tried their best to play the role of waiters - but really just seemed to be friends with the chef and not that much into sushi. The music is loud and they have a huge projector playing music videos, so I guess that they were targeting the young, roll loving audience, which shows in the amount of different sushi rolls on the menu. I get easily confused then, and have discovered a “lengthy” menu is not a good sign for a sushi bar…
We sat at the bar and talked a little with the owner of the place. He had previously owned a sushi bar in Tahoe I think he said, and seemed to want to come off as a proper sushi chef. We were willing to let him.
We were not that hungry, so we just had some rolls (California rolls named Britney!?) and some blackened tuna. And, the food was not bad at all. It was modern, fusion like sushi - targeting the Americans that requires amounts of food, not necessarily quality of food. Well, that was the feel of it. I think there is a huge market there. And we wish him well. It just is not my kind crowd, and not my kind of sushi place anymore.
Iiik. I think I am turning into more of a purist…
Summary:
Someones dream came true in opening this place. A bit too fancy for my taste in sushi bars, but he gets credit for trying.
| Overall rating: |   |
| Presentation: |   |
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| Price level: | Ok |
| Times visited: | 1 |
General information:
Street address: 400 Tyler St, Monterey, CA 93940
Opening hours:
Phone number:(831) 373 TUNA
How did you like Pink Tuna - Downtown, Monterey?
I agree that this is not necessarily the traditional sushi bar, but they have good and fun sushi. Sometimes you need to take traditions to the next level and “local influences” might be interesting too. I like this place.
Hey Peter, and thanks for your feedback.
I did just visit this bar once and hope I didn’t sound too critical in my review. I don’t mean that all sushi bars should be traditional. Then I would never get my rolls…
Having yours and other sushi lovers opinions stated here as well is therefor very important! Thank you.
You can also see from the poll that most people think their food is delicious! They have lots of fans!
I’ve eaten at Pink Tuna twice, and that’s one time too many. The first time the server seemed unfamiliar with the menu, which was excusable because the place had just opened. The sushi rolls were good, although expensive.
The second time our server (a different person) didn’t seem to remember anything we asked for. Miso soup and tea finally appeared after reminding her (it didn’t seem like she was too busy to remember, the place was almost empty and she spent a lot of time folding napkins). My vegetarian companion ordered the bento box with vegetarian options: extra veggie tempura in place of shrimp tempura, and tomago.
After a while, the server came back and informed us that they were out of tomago (a roll made with cooked egg) so my friend chose a different vegetarian option. A while later her plate appeared with not only tempura shrimp, but also with hamachi (yellowtail) nigiri. Our server made it right after we pointed out the problem, but it took a few moments. The check was also a long time coming, which added to the delay.
Aside from the food, which was good but not especially memorable, the atmosphere of the place wasn’t very comfortable or interesting. Lights hang from the vaulted cieling just a little too high above the tables, giving one the uncomfortable sensation of being interrogated during dinner. The contemporary top 40 music mix might have been tolerable had there been a large crowd to drown it out.
Unfortunately, with the place being somewhat empty, the music was too loud and reminded me of dance clubs in Mexico where they play house music at ear shattering volumes, hoping to lure drunk Americans in from the street. The decor consists of a few sad pelagic fish, mounted and painted as if they were gas tanks from customized Harleys, all chromy silver and metallic pink flames. If the theme were taken to a more extreme level (say with pink seaweed wallpaper) then it might be fun, but as it is, it’s like a halfhearted attempt to join the burgeoning crowd of hipster sushi joints like Pink Godzilla and Mobo in Santa Cruz.
One final note: the bathrooms were nice.
Kris - thank you for your review! Maybe you have a favorite sushi bar in Monterey? Wanna write about it?
Our company requests that you relinquish using the name Pink Tuna and a similiarity to our logo as it is registered by the USPTO as a registered trademark. We will forward legal documents to your office from our company to rectify this situation as soon as possible. We would appreciate your immediate attention to this matter.
Sincerely.
The Pink Tuna, Inc.
info@thepinktuna.com
I don’t understand why you are sending me this, but forward all the documents you want to. All we at Sushi or Death (and if you ever use that we will forward documents to YOUR office…) did was write a review of a sushi bar called “Pink Tuna”. Whether you like it or not.
We will definitely not buy anything from your website thats for sure… And posting this as a comment… How smart was that on a scale from 1-10 you think?
What was THAT all about. Something is up Pink Tuna’s @$$es it seem. Totally agree with you on this one…its a FREAKING RESTAURANT REVIEW!!! If they wanna sue anyone, they should be suing Pink Tuna in Monterey…There, I said “PINK TUNA” again…OOopppppssss! There I go again…a-holes.
You are getting me in trouble here, G-lato… (love that name of yours - feel like ice cream now). But they can’t mess with us. We are way to cool for them. Thanks for your comment!
LOL! Thanks I got that name from my bro-in-law, were discussing food related names that contained something with “G” in it, since my name is pronounced like the letter “G”. Definitely you guys are way too cool for them so they can go sell their PINK TUNA (doh! I said it again!!! Haha) elsewhere lol. I think I’m gonna boycott them actually…I don’t like how they don’t use logic and just threaten people just because they are a “corporation”…I guess I should go harass all websites with any content that has WHITE CARROT now. Hahaha. Ridiculous.
I’ve never actually been to the Pink Tuna, but my boyfriend used to work at Doc Ricketts, the club next door. From what he told me, the owner of Docs and Pink Tuna are buddies, and the main people the sushi place is trying to attract are the club-goers next door.
Reading these reviews makes me not want go. Thanks for saving me a bit of money! :p
I’m a regular at Punk Tuna in monterey. My boyfriend and i found it while driving around alvarado, trying to find good sushi places. we decided to try this place because,looking from the outside, the place looked different from the authentic sushi bars monterey has. I’m originally from the area, but when i went to San Francisco for college, the city had many asian fusion sushi bars and i fell in love with them. The different varieties were waaay better than the authentic, small, sushi bars that you normally see here.
I always get the high roller, which is a california roll with baked salmon on the top, with added spiciness. Another roll that i had, which i forgot the name to, had ahi with macadamia nuts, and avacado, topped with a sweet sauce. there’s a lot of sushi varieties for everyone. It’s a good place to eat dinner on a date or with a group of friends. From a scale from 1-10(10 being the best), i’d give it an 8 or a B+. Because, although the food is great, the service can be slow when the restaurant is full.But that’s how every restaurant is when it’s full. Also, when the restaurant is full, the rolls seems to shrink in size compared to when the restaurant is not full. Anyway,I don’t know about you, but every time i go there, the servers know what they’re doing, and they sometimes suggest entrees to try. My bf and I even got samples to try, compliments from the owner.!
Whenever we go, we spend an average of $35-$45 dollars, which includes 2 orders of sushi, a bento box, and drinks. of course, if you add alcoholic beverages, it’ll run from $45-$55+. But i truly recommend this place. It’s the only asian-fusion restaurant out here in this area. the next place you’ll have to go would probably be in san jose or frisco….or samurai in salinas, but that’s another story.
My husband and I loved the food but had horrible customer service. He ordered the teryiaki filet with prawns and it cam out rather quickly. I know sushi takes longer but I didnt get my meal until 27 minutes after his…..it was odd to eat one at a time, LOL.
The waitress never brought us a spoon for our soup even though we asked her 3 times. I’ve got to say the wrost part was that I had my credit card sitting on the table as I was balancing my check book and the waitress walked by and grabbed it without me noticing and charged my card without showing us the bill. Overall great food but highly undertrained staff.