Intriguing Vegan Sushi in Kerrisdale

Two pieces of mango and avocado nigiri at Shoku

Vancouver has some vegan restaurants, or places that serve some vegan dishes, but what about vegan sushi?

A place called Shoku in the city's Kerrisdale neighbourhood touts itself as a vegan sushi restaurant. I had heard some good things about it from an acquaintance months ago and I finally checked it out the other day.

California and dynamite rolls with vegan crab

It occupies the space that was previously a Japanese restaurant, and some of the staff here are Japanese. We went for a late lunch and there were still several tables occupied on a weekday. The menu is quite extensive with so many different kinds of dishes to choose from that it's kind of hard to decide.

Most of them feature vegetables, while others are vegan sashimi or sushi.

The first dish that arrived at our table was the tofu katsu, where medium-firm tofu was covered in panko and deep-fried. We dipped it in a tonkatsu sauce and while it was nicely deep-fried, it wasn't particularly outstanding, but thought it would be different than ordering agedashi tofu.

Next came two rolls on a plate -- California and dynamite. Both had vegan crab meat but we couldn't figure out what it was exactly so it didn't taste like a California roll per se. The dynamite roll included deep-fried asparagus, avocado, and cucumber. 

Assorted vegetable tempura plate

Looking more closely at the menu online now and the shiitake maki would have been a better choice, or veggie roll with corn, beets, avocado and cucumber.

The assorted vegetable tempura was delicious, nicely deep fried and presented. The shiitake mushrooms were spread out like fans, and also on the plate were carrots, sweet potato, pumpkin and asparagus.

We also ordered the mango and avocado nigiri, complete with vegan mentaiko! Refreshing and different.

Our final dish and most intriguing was the spicy tuna sashimi. It was not presented like slices of raw fish, but cubed on a plate drizzled with hot sauce mixed with Kewpie mayonnaise on a bed of greens. The cubes were red with thin whiteish lines to make it look like fish.

The taste was definitely jelly like but at the same time had a slight fish smooth texture. It's hard to describe but perhaps that's why it was cubed to be eaten one at a time; a slice would give it away.

The "sashimi" looked fishy, tasted like jelly

By the end of the lunch we were too full for dessert. There were so many other dishes to try that we will probably be back!

Shoku

2260 West 41st Avenue

Vancouver, BC

604 566 6556