Imperial Koi

While David and I were in Greensboro, we met up with lots of my mom’s friends and colleagues. It was really fun to meet the people that hang out with my mom (her social calendar is more packed than mine!) On the day after Christmas, we went to one of her favorite restaurants in Greensboro, Imperial Koi, for an afternoon filled with good food and good conversation. Imperial Koi is located on New Garden Road in Greensboro in a new development area (I know that it’s on the way to the airport):

My mom has been to the restaurant a lot since it opened earlier this year (there are literally 5 good restaurants in Greensboro and my mom goes to them on a rotation) so the owner/chef knows her very well. As soon as we walked into the restaurant, the chef came to greet us and said he would take care of our party so everyone was well fed.

Before we get to the awesome food, let me show you who I sat across from:

Chloe and Ryan are really cute and well behaved kids. Ryan really dotes on Chloe and gives her lots of kisses – it is so cute and makes me want to have lots of babies (some day!). Another cute shot:

Everyone at the table started off with a cup of miso soup:

And then the hugest plate of sushi I have EVER seen came out:

The Imperial Koi love boat boasts 16 pieces of assorted sashimi (yellowtail is my favorite, tuna or salmon is my mom’s favorite, and David likes everything), 8 pieces of sushi, and a dynamite roll, which sounds awesome BECAUSE IT IS. The Dynamite roll is spicy crabmeat, avocado, lobster salad, spicy mayo, and tempura. It was my favorite roll of the day (which is saying a lot because all of the rolls were AMAZING).

The next roll that came out was the angry dragon roll:

The angry dragon roll came with shrimp tempura, spicy tuna, papaya, and spicy king crab all wrapped in pink soy bean nori. I haven’t seen different color nori being used since I was working in Connecticut (backstory: there were some great sushi places in Connecticut by GE and the manager I worked with loved sushi, so we’d go to different Japanese restaurants that served sushi every day. Best internship ever.) The angry dragon roll was protein packed and the shrimp tempura stayed delicately crisp even though I spent more time than necessary trying to get a good picture of the dish.

The ultimate roll came out shortly after:

The ultimate roll came with tempura lobster, romaine lettuce, avocado, mango, kiwi eel sauce, and strawberry sauce in a white soy crepe. I love the way Imperial Koi used different types of wraps (regular seaweed gets old after a while!) My lobster was a little soggy, but my mom had an end piece and she said the lobster was perfectly tender and still had a crispy exterior.

The New Garden roll came next:

The New Garden roll comes with deep fried soft shell crab, spicy king crab, black caviar, lettuce, Parmesan cheese, jalapeno, sweet basil, eel, and white soybean paper. The table really liked this roll because it had deep fried soft shell crab and was slightly spicy.

This was my second favorite roll of the day:

Since David and Ryan both have allergies, the chef brought out some udon noodles for Ryan (sautéed with vegetables) and brought out some lamb chops as well (Ryan has been to the restaurant previously and the lamb chops are one of his favorites):

The lamb chops come with fingerling potatoes and are done surprisingly well for an Asian restaurant. The lamb chops are a good choice for someone that doesn’t want to eat raw fish, but seriously, the rolls at Imperial Koi are so delicious that you’d really be missing out if you didn’t try one of their rolls.

As the steak came out, everyone at the table was unbuttoning their pants or loosening up a belt notch. It was quite a lot of food, even for 7 adults. The steak:

The steak was prepared with a sauce (I always prefer sauce on the side) with a side of rice and broccoli (if you take out the sauce, it’s the way David and I used to eat steak when we were kids).

Everyone before we started filling up on the delicious rolls and meat:

Me and David with Peter, the chef and owner:

And after we ate a TON of food, the chef sent out two molten chocolate cakes with vanilla ice cream:

I love the combination of warm chocolate cake and cold vanilla ice cream. Heck, I love any mixture of chocolate and vanilla!

The meal at Imperial Koi was one of the best meals I’ve had in Greensboro: delicious and inventive rolls, a wonderful atmosphere, and it’s definitely worth a visit. I know I always say that I like unadulterated sashimi, but the rolls at Imperial Koi are definitely worth a visit. In case you’re wondering, the other restaurants in Greensboro that are worth visiting are: Cookout, Ganache (only for their cakes – their food is way too greasy), Green Valley Grille, Lucky 32, Promixity’s Print Works Bistro, and Saffron.