EuroRevs

Eat Tokyo Notting Hill Gate
Date of visit: October 2025 

I used to study here, in Notting Hill. In fact, I was persuaded to stick around this area. This was before a literature degree reflected a curated re-enactment, typically including the obligatory pop into the local bookstore.

Before cobbled cul-de-sacs and cozy cat cafes, there was a fishmonger right by Notting Hill Gate station, a tiny Pret a manger and Starbucks.

Now we have Eat Tokyo – an authentic Japanese restaurant that also operates several branches across London, including locations in Soho, Hammersmith, Holborn, and Golders Green.

Recently, director Mr Hiroshi Takayama was proud to bring the Taste of Japan to the Grand London Sumo Tournament (the first held outside of Japan). Here are some clips from the event at The Royal Albert Hall, along with the Eat Tokyo Company’s Head Chef Motohashi and Head Chef Wu discussing Chanko Nabe with a Director of Fallow restaurant, Chef Will Murray.

We won’t be eating Chanko Nabe at Eat Tokyo.

Here’s what you can eat at a sit down, authentic Japanese restaurant in London that serves sushi.

The menu at Eat Tokyo Notting Hill Gate

There are restaurants I scrape to find a full online, up-to-date, a la carte menu for and this is one of them. Extensive higher-low end price points: from A5 wagyu cuts of beef, to cucumber rolls using Premium Grade sushi rice; a high quality, short grain variety. I am not a sushi making expert but I hear that rice is one, if not the most important elements that classify good sushi from bad sushi.

I love sea urchin: the addition of uni when in season makes Eat Tokyo stand out even more for me. It’s not an omakase style restaurant. There is no unspoken “I’ll leave it to you” request to the Sushi Master when it comes to the menu. A laminated booklet reads like a scroll, blanketing the dark dinng wooden table top. It takes a good read and many visits to get through. Did I mention I love sea urchin?

The uni is buttery and nutty with a hint of that full-fat tomalley flavour profile carrying it through at end of first bite. This symphonic undertone lingers until the last bite. It is generously portioned here onto the rice in an uni nigiri format. There’s only one thing better: fresh sea urchin eaten out directly out from its shell with, perhaps, a squeeze of citrus circulating in between the strips of pumpkin- coloured gonad.

Flying fish roe or tobiko crackles and pops in the mouth with a moreish briny sweetness. A bite of pickled ginger in between the two nigiris to cleanse the palate make this a well rounded choice of nigiri for someone, like myself, who appreciates good rice but doesn’t need a lot of it with every bite.

Eat Tokyo also has branches in Japan and Germany. In a saturated market of London restaurants offering sushi as Asian fusion foods or high end authentic Japanese sushi, Eat Tokyo hits that mark at being welcoming to enthusiastic eaters. There’s a tapas style to the way the dishes read in print that screams more.

Going through it, the extensive here in Notting Hill may be the largest. There are appetisers expected of an authentic Japanese restaurant in London and then there are complete surprises. Vegan salmon tartare, unagi and or sake foie gras and fatty funa or otoro as opposed to holding back at chu-toro – all make an entrance. Soups and ramens take a bow here and there but most regulars go for a set dish or all out on the range of wagyu beef selections to choose from. It’s fun, is what I’m getting at.

A simple butter asparagus dish is executed perfectly. It’s sweet and salty, light yet rich, with the lemon butter peppered ever so subtly as it clings to the trimmed, steamed three-bite earthy stick.

The sea snails are chewy. There was an inedible part which was a flat delicate shell: easy to remove from the organ itself, which I gleefully poked out to eat. Like a cockle without vinegar, a mussel without cream, squeaky and meaty to the bite: a yummy treat on the end of a toothpick. It looked as ugly as it was delicious (see photo below). Order them. Their fragrant broth is reason to as it carries that savoury sweet balance so typically used in Japanese cooking. The clean fragrance owing to the plentiful ginger steeped inside the bowl. A hint of white pepper could be detected, which gave a freshly fermented, warm end-note to the dish.

I didn’t know what to expect from sea snails at Eat Tokyo. I’ve mentioned that the typical restaurant preparation in Europe can come from a can, then re-stuffed into used shells. This was more of a bulot which was exceedingly popular and equally affordable in Normandy, France.

The California rolls and asparagus rolls can be seen in the background of the photo above are not to be dismissed by their price point. Fresh ingredients; the use of chunks of crab rather than surimi, for example, generously fill or wrap all the rolls and temaki I have sampled at Eat Tokyo.

The sashimi selection cannot be faulted. If you prefer your raw fish without rice, you won’t be disappointed with the freshness and quality they provide.

Ratings!

Eat Tokyo in Notting Hill.

Food – 7.9/10

Value for money 7/10 (£25-35 pp including alcoholic beverages)

Vibes – 6/10