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Review content:
Sushi Para is located in a suburban strip mall on Dundee Road just off IL 53 in Palatine. It sits adjacent to a small, dingy Asian supermarket and the interior of the restaurant is equally sparse, if not outright bland. There are several sets of tables arranged around both sides and a cramped sushi bar towards the back, and beware, this restaurant fills up fast when groups of locals show up. It can go from an absolute crawl to packed in the space of fifteen minutes with three or four families.
I go to Sushi Para specifically for their all-you-can-eat dinner, which costs about $18.95 per person (and sliding scales for kids). While there is a lunch menu, its offerings are more limited particularly for the specialty rolls that I enjoy (like the Palatine roll, Rainbow roll, American Dream). You can order the dinner menu for all-you-can-eat at any time. The regular menu has all the normal staples, ranging from the obligatory teriyaki and don entrees to several soups, maki and nori rolls, and specialty rolls you won't find on the all-you-can-eat menu which is otherwise fairly extensive. It includes regulars like miso soup, tempura, edamame and very good gyoza down through the typical sushi over rice.
It's very important to note that Sushi Para does _not_ skimp on their rice on the rolls, which means an 8 piece roll is enormous. Eyes bigger than your stomach will get you in the wallet afterwards; they charge for unfinished pieces, and can get pretty niggling from time to time, so do keep that in mind. Another point of contention for me is the overuse of fillers like avocado, lettuce, and cucumber that sometimes make those rolls too hard to actually get in your mouth.
Though the restaurant is generally clean and fairly pleasant, the customer service would drop this rating to one star if the food didn't make up for it. As a standard practice, put down all the food you want to order on the first sheet because your waitress many only reappear two or three times during the course of a one hour stay. Servers aren't hired for their attentiveness, with one or two exceptions. We regularly see them standing around at the back of the restaurant deliberately staring at the ceiling while irritated customers try to draw their attention gracefully, orders ready or glasses of water, tea, and other beverages completely empty. When the sushi bar gets busy, which is any time after 4:00 PM, their behaviour and failure to come around becomes outright rude. I've had waitresses just drop down plates and wander off, nearly knock over bowls and get their hands/arms/elbows in our water because they were in such a hurry to get back to their posts. A table of three or four can wait 40 minutes for attention when there were 6 waitresses and the hostess, three sushi chefs, and four tables to manage. Surely trying to get their notice shouldn't involve waving our arms, raising our hands, or just walking up to the sushi bar ourselves with the sheet because we were hungry. We've had trays wait for ten minutes because our waitress never bothered to look over five feet and see it was up. Several people I know, as well as myself, have said it's pointless to ask questions about what's in some of the unlabeled rolls (like the Rock and Roll) because you'll never get an answer.
You get what you pay for here: the trade off for the selection are rice-heavy rolls that can really vary in freshness (hint: go early for the best rice/selection of fish) and abominable wait times to get your food or refills.
Pros: Specialty rolls, all you can eat for $18
Cons: Terrible service, location, rice,
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