By: Munira Ahmadad

Garnell Sushi and Poke is a sushi restaurant located in Cairo that my cousin recommended we go to when I was seeing my family in Egypt. The seating was pretty good, and the outside area of the restaurant was pleasing with a fountain and palm trees with lights on them.

The food was good; I can’t say I’m the most fit to judge how sushi is supposed to taste, as I don’t recall any time I had sushi prior to my summer vacation in Cairo, but the overall taste of the sushi was good. You choose what you want and select how many pieces off the menu, so I just picked things at random.

The texture of the rice was pretty good, the fish was flavorful, and the sauce topping was a good addition to the sushi pieces. I had difficulty trying to eat the ones with cooked batter over it because they were especially heavy and chewing through them and staying neat was a mild challenge. However, the sushi in general was very filling and I couldn’t eat much so my cousin helped a lot.

Service was okay as far as I can tell, because I don’t speak Arabic. My mom does, so the staff seemed pretty happy about that. The next time I do go to Cairo, I would like to revisit this restaurant and try it again, because I enjoyed Garnell and it was one of my favorite food-related parts of my trip.

Overall, I would rate:

• The food: 7/10. The pieces were really big, and it would have been better if they had been smaller. The rice was also a little too sweet.
• The ambiance: 10/10. I liked the palm trees and it looked especially nice at night.
• The service: 8/10. I didn’t speak directly to them, but they seemed to act nicely to my mom. Again, not being able to speak Arabic made it hard at first, but then things got easier when they realized my mom spoke Arabic.