About us

 

It started one night in 2011 in Los Angeles, when 2 Hard Rock Cafe co-workers and aspiring musicians wanted to make something different for dinner with their friends.  J.D. Sakamoto and John Hoffmann ventured to a local Asian market downtown to secure the supplies.  J.D., having knowledge passed down from his sushi chef father, led the group.  Everyone took turns creating their unique rolls, learning along the way.  J.D. and John, seeing the fun that the group had that evening, decided to take the concept and create a mobile sushi bar, offering sushi catering at homes and offices, while showing people how to roll behind the scenes. 

And just like that… Roll This Way was born.

A few months later, J.D's dreams of rock stardom came true, as he was signed and began touring with his band, leaving the torch with John to continue developing the business.   In early 2012, John decided to move back to his hometown of Toronto, and continue his culinary education, specializing in sushi, to strengthen his skills and knowledge. 

Not long after, he was  given the opportunity to travel across Canada with Cirque du Soleil, making sushi for thousands of VIP clientele, further honing his skills. In 2017, his wife joined the team and helped to open Roll This Way’s first Sushi Bar at the prestigious Windermere House in Muskoka. In 2018, The Thompson Hotel Rooftop and Vintage Conservatory was home to their next residencies, where they continued to grow their list of private clientele. 

In the spring of 2020, with the collapse of the catering industry, they successfully pivoted their business to adjust to a new landscape and began to offer sushi making classes on zoom, developing Sushi Making 101.  This concept quickly took off and found great success with such companies as Google, IBM, Meta, Shopify, Home Depot, Pinterest and thousands more.  

The team expanded to bring on a roster of over a dozen chefs from around the world, each with a diverse background, each offering their own unique skills to the team.  They eventually expanded their location at 14 Logan Ave to a world class venue called Origami Event Studio, with 3 rooms, spanning 5,000 s.f.  Today, after catering hundreds of weddings, corporate lunches, bar mitzvahs, bachelorette parties and birthdays, and teaching tens of thousands of students, their team of skilled chefs are eager to make your next event one for the books.