Weekday lunch hours just got a lot more appetising this September! The All You Can Eat Maki promotion at the YUMI by Taj offers an exciting array of all-you-can-eat makis on a value-for-money deal that shouldn’t be missed. The All You Can Eat Maki promotion for Rs. 6,500 + taxes per person offers 10 varieties of signature makis that you can eat as much of during lunch hours (12.30-3.00pm) from Monday to Friday.  The promotion is inclusive of hot Tori Jiru soup (chicken miso soup) and a choice of ice cream as dessert. How it works is, you order 4 varieties of makis at one time and continue to order more as you finish. Given that Japanese is generally an expensive affair even if you order one or two dishes, an all-you-can-eat Japanese promotion with unlimited makis is a real win for the wallet for sushi aficionados.

“The All You Can Eat Maki promotion is a fantastic deal that’s value for money. YUMI has positioned itself as one of Colombo’s finest Japanese spots with our signature dishes that the regulars love. The All You Can Eat Maki promotion invites you to enjoy a good value lunch with an exciting variety of signature makis that will surprise you” commented Avishek Mukherjee, Director – Food & Beverage at Taj. 

The All You Can Eat Maki menu has a fantastic variety of veg and non veg makis that are truly signature to the YUMI ethos. YUMI Japanese chefs Heenkenda and Sudesh are masters in their craft and well-known and loved by regulars for their creativity and innovations. In Japanese cuisine, fresh ingredients are everything but it’s also what you do with them, that elevates the meal to another level. At lunch, we tried 5 makis from the All You Can Eat Maki menu:

Kudamono Maki
We were promised an exciting meal with surprises and the chefs made a grand entrance with the Kudamono Maki. Fresh avocado, pineapple and mango in a roll, wrapped with thin slices of strawberry – our first ever fruit maki. With its sweet, fruity flavours the Kudamono Maki was surprisingly delicious. 

Cheese And Dates Maki 
A fusion of flavours, this maki had crispy tempura fried dates, cream cheese, and kalamata olives in a roll topped with chopped pistachio and tonkatsu sauce. What we liked about this maki was how well each ingredient complimented the other; the sweetness of the dates was balanced by the creaminess of the cheese and complimented by the meaty texture of the kalamata olives. 

Sashimi Mame Maki
After two sweet makis, the Sashimi Mame Maki with salmon, tuna, crab stick and lettuce, carrot and radish zuma wrapped in a soya bean sheet was the perfect palate cleanser. The maki allowed us to enjoy the taste of fresh, sashimi-grade fish, uninfluenced by bolder flavours.  

Midori Maki
This was one of our favourite makis – cream cheese, avocado, tempura green vegetables in a roll of Japanese seasoned rice topped with tempura crushed curry leaf and spring onion. We loved the piquancy of certain ingredients and the creaminess of the cream cheese and avocado contrasted beautifully with the tempura vegetables. 

Fujiyama Maguro Maki
Everyone’s favourite volcano maki never disappoints. As the finale to our meal, the crispy tempura prawn in a roll, topped with tuna, tanuki, tobiko and chef’s special sauce was delicious. The Fujiyama Maguro maki is a YUMI classic that must be tried. 

Overall, we had a great lunch. We love a classic Japanese meal but it was also so exciting to be surprised by a new dish – testing flavour and texture combinations we thought would never work and finding out that they do.  The All You Can Eat Maki menu is curated well, balancing the expectation of wanting the usual maki rolls while also introducing creative fusion makis to give guests the value-added experience of trying something new for the very first time.

Pics Pradeep Dilrukshana