Restaurant Review: The Cowfish Sushi Burger Bar

Once upon a time, there was an amazing burger place right outside of SouthPark Mall: The Counter. This place was amazing, and when it closed I was devastated. Once it was replaced with The Cowfish Sushi Burger Bar, my grief quickly went away. The Cowfish is absolutely amazing. It's owned by the same people who own eeZ in Birkdale, and having dined there, I knew the food would be delicious & inventive, and I was absolutely right. But then again, I'm always right =)

The Cowfish has the traditional style rolls (Philly, rainbow, etc) and a huge list of wildly inventive & exotic rolls to choose from as well. When Graham & I visited the day after Christmas, I wanted to try something different than I had ordered on previous visits. We decided on three (although I wanted about ten...), one from each section: the rainbow (a traditional roll), the blackened tuna (a more unique/fusion style roll) & the Doug's Filet Roll (burgushi).

I'll start with the burgushi, because it's what makes The Cowfish stand out above other sushi restaurants (and Charlotte has a TON of them!). Burgushi is taking the elements of a burger and making it into a sushi roll, or taking the elements of a sushi roll and making it into a burger/sandwich.

This was amazing. Absolutely amazing. I could even look past the blob of cream cheese (which I HATE in sushi). The roll was enormous, but everything about it was perfect, I really loved the spicy sauce and the very mild flavor of the filet. This is definitely my favorite item on the "burgushi" part of the menu, so far.

The Rainbow Roll was, of course, my favorite. The fish was fresh & firm, the sauce was nice & didn't overpower the roll. I absolutely hate it when there is so much sauce you can't really taste anything else. I would have been more than happy to eat this all day.

The last roll we had was the blackened tuna:

While this roll was good, it didn't compare to the other two. The roll tasted dry & the slice of jalapeno was completely overpowering. However, the guacamole was a nice touch and absolutely delicious. I removed the jalapeno and added a different kind of heat with a little srirachia. It was a better flavor combination, in my opinion and I enjoyed the remaining pieces a lot more with this change.

Not only was the food excellent during our lunch time visit, but the service was excellent as well. Our server took the time to go over every single aspect of the menu, and gave us a recommendation out of each category. The Filet Roll was one of her suggestions, and I'm so glad we went with that.

My ONLY complaint here is that they are always busy, and they only take reservations from 11:00-6:00, which makes zero sense to me. Especially since most of the shops in the area (excluding the mall), close at 6:00 or 7:00. Lunch patrons can browse & shop while waiting for a table. Dinner patrons can not. I had wanted to eat here for our anniversary, but knew we would have to either wait forever or eat at the bar, so we changed our plans. We still had to wait, but 15 minutes isn't too bad in the grand scheme of things. Last time I went was on a Thursday night, and the wait was much, much longer so we ended up dining at the bar. Fine for a dinner with a friend, not as okay for an anniversary dinner with your husband. However, this place is worth the wait and I can not wait to go back on my next trip home.