USHIWAKAMARU THE GREAT

             

                    USHI WAKAMARU!!!!

Somehow I just want to yell that name.

Apparently, it's the name of an 12th century Japanese superhero. Now he's reborn as a delightful sushi restaurant in Noho, on 136 Houston St. between McDougal and Sullivan, saving me from my sushi doldrums and ho hums.

As a sushiphile, I've eaten at some of the sushi greats in the city - Masa, Nobu, Morimoto, Tomoe, Sushi Yasuda, En Japanese Brasserie, Sakagura, Jewel Bako, etc. While all those places merit a special place in the sushi pantheon, for quality, freshness and authenticity, I had settled on Tomoe. I've been a die-hard Tomoe fan for many years, standing in line for hours in the snow, ready with beers in the summers. Yet this unpretentious place, Ushi Wakamaru, has so impressed me that I'm naming it my favourite sushi place in the city. 

The fish is delicate and expertly cut so that it disintegrates on your tongue. The owner and chef Hideo has his fish delivered from Japan 2-3 times weekly and also uses local fish. Also, Ushi Wakamaru has some of the finest cooked appetizers presented in unexpectedly architectural detail. Among them is the cooked scallops heated on a giant shell over flames still licking the sides. The eggplant soup is also deliciously hearty - the miso soup is flavoured with shrimp heads.

The uni deserves a separate paragraph of its own. It's unlike any uni I have ever tasted - fragrant, juicy, salty, perfect. Usually, uni can be slimy and almost repellent when ordinary mortals prepare it.  At Ushi, the sublime uni is a result of excellent quality and expert preparation.

Upon ordering sake, the waitress brought us a selection of sake cups and asked us to choose. We ended up with charmingly mismatched cups.

Hideo was very interested in teaching us about the fish and pointing out what we were going to have next and flavours to watch for. He was also very indulgently responsive - if I asked him about a certain fish, he'd tell me about it, and cut me some to sample and compare with the Japanese vs local market fish. As the night grew long (we had nabbed a 9pm reservation the night before to sit at the sushi bar in front of Hideo) and we all grew friendlier, there was a comical moment where Hideo wanted to tell us a Japanese idiom (and of course we didn't get it) when all the remaining patrons pitched in trying to translate in vain (Neatly perfect? Perfectly fitting? Fitting tight?). Altogether, it was a memorable and enjoyable evening.

Here are some tips to enjoying Ushi:

1. SHOCKER! They take reservations, unlike Tomoe. Ask to sit at the sushi bar.
    If you can nab it, sit in front of the owner/chef Hideo and chat him up.
2. Order the omakase $70 - it's an over generous sampling of what Ushi offers.
      (matter of fact, the waitress remarked astonishedly - you're getting two
        omakases for two people? It's A LOT of food! Turns out she was right.)
3. The tiny shrimp sashimi is juicy and sweet.
4. The uni is a must. Once you have it here, it will be such toil to have it anywhere else.


                              Here's a laughing Hideo and Schnapp:

                                       

                     

     and for dessert, some homemade grapefruit jelly (sorry it's half eaten):

                                      

It's the relaxed, authentic, un-messed with quality of Ushi Wakamaru that leaves me mesmerized.  Unadorned and elegant, the slices of toro inspire all manner of comparisons with Josef Hoffman's furniture design.

I think many of us have accepted for fact that for truly great sushi, we must mortgage the house. Having done taste comparisons of the aforementioned bastions of sushi, I can honestly say that the equation:

                                             fancy = quality

is rubbish. Ushiwakamaru is a sushi paragon to be had at a bargain - but it'll only stay a secret for so long. From the outside, it's easy to imagine that there are no superheroes here - but now you know to yell Ushiwakamaru!