That's How He Rolls

-The secret ingredient is love. (And wasabi.)-

There's a popular sushi place nearby called Arigato that I frequent whenever I need a quick hit of sushi. In fact, Arigato is where most people in my part of Sac go for their fish fix. I can call up my order at any moment - every self-respecting Sacramentan has the menu memorized, it's one of the ways we identify our own - and pick it up in about ten minutes. My usual: a Spicy Johnny Roll and a TNT Roll. If I'm dining in I'll grab a bowl of miso soup and some hot tea as well.

Arigato's sushi isn't exactly ephemeral, eye-opening, or even all that great, but it is half-price all the time. Furthermore, they're located in a middle class area of a lower class neighborhood and providentially near the California State University, Sacramento campus where hungry students roam. A combination of low prices and locale have made it a commercial success. They're now open until midnight and recently revamped the decor from J-Pop hip to a throwback Vegas-eighties kitsch that make me wish I would go spontaneously blind when I walk in the front door.

Still, one can't complain too much. The food is palatable and affordable. Any eater can certainly do worse.

Having a source so close I was surprised when BF mentioned that he wanted to learn to make sushi. While he's adept at the grill I had never seen him actively pursue a type of cuisine that I hadn't sort of nudged him into myself. It was downright surprising, if not just a bit odd. This was culinary equivalent to the president suddenly coming out to the press room to say we would invade Denmark. It just sort of left me in a "Wha?" state.

I encouraged him but with a slight of eye I rolled the plan as nothing more than a simple passing feign of interest. Yet he spent days watching tutorials online and asked me to help him do research to find a comprehensive sushi cookbook. I unburied an old sushi knife I had received in a conference goodie bag years ago (I had never used it due to its frustrating slant and bevel that made it perfect for cutting through sticky rice but useless for any other task). I explained he could line one of my bamboo placemats with plastic wrap and use that in place of a traditional bamboo roll.

The day came when he told me he was going to make sushi for dinner that night. I smiled and played the thankful food blogger, happy for a night off from cooking and happy for a potential blog post. Yet I had no high hopes that this would be anything grand.

-Better than any restaurant.-

I arrived home from work to find the kitchen a disaster. Plates and bowls stacked upon each other, starchy rice covered everything, at least four knives were strewn about haphazardly. I thought to myself that this is why I hate when others cook in my kitchen.

Yet, as I glanced at the counter I saw rolls of neatly trimmed ribbons of dark pink salmon stacked next to batons of cucumber and avocado. The air was sweet with the smell or rice, chilies, and soy. I realized I might have been a bit quick to judge. Apparently, he had made sushi.

BF motioned me to the table. Sitting on a plate were the handmade sushi rolls which looked, well, like sushi. This isn't to say it wasn't what I was expecting, it's just that I didn't know what to expect.

They were humble looking. Unlike the kaleidoscopic rolls you see in a restaurant covered in ruffles of avocado and buried in tobiko these where simple, dressed with a basic chili-mayo sauce. Next to the plate was a bowl, surprisingly, gratifyingly, of freshly grated wasabi. (I despise the phosphorescent blobs of wasabi served at 99% of sushi houses. It's all raw heat. The fresh wasabi was a horseradish with rumbling pungency that perfectly balanced the buttery flavors of the fish and fruit tucked in the rolls.) Lastly, there was a bowl of soy dipping sauce mixed with a bit of sugar and chili.

Taking a pair of chopsticks I rubbed a bit of the wasabi over the roll and then plucked it up for a quick dip in the soy before popping it in my mouth.

Lord, I forgot just how simple sushi is supposed to be. It's a cuisine born out of impoverished beginnings. You don't need the deep-fried, crab covered, unagi sauced, lemon spritzed jumble that defines modern, American-style sushi. Homemade in a small batch BF had crafted rolls that highlighted their ingredients. Rice, fish, cucumber, and avocado. A few condiments on the side to compliment these basic ingredients completed the experience. This was some of the best sushi I had ever eaten.

Even economically this meal was amazing. Once the key ingredients had been purchased - rice, vinegar, and nori, which would last for months - the rest was easy. BF estimated that considering how cheap sushi fish was, even at its freshest, the cost was minimal. After buying a pound of salmon, plus an avocado and a cucumber he realized he could make about six eight-piece sushi rolls, each roll coming out to a total cost of about $1.50.

I've requested that he continue to learn to make sushi of all kinds. My hope is to be spoiled rotted with fresh fish.

-Hello, little sushi.-

Taro's - Not So Much a Review as an Overall Critique on Trendy Sushi

I have taken a long time going over this review and written it a few different ways. The reason being is I can't seem to say what I want to say in the way I want to say it, at least not without getting off track. So this won't be so much a review as a critique, and not of Taro's but of sushi.

I won't go over the food dish by dish, trying to creatively lay out each handcrafted, colorful roll and describing their dizzying list of ingredients or the elegant simplicity of the miso soup. Taro's does a fine job on all fronts. The staff are polite and knowledgeable. Quite on the spot in fact. The decor is edgy and trendy, a magnet for that hip twenty-something crowd, yet relaxed enough for the everyday diner. The amount of Mikuni paraphernalia is a bit inundated with bobble heads and t-shirts, but nothing that borders on the level of a tourist trap.

In fact there is nothing really wrong. The food is delicious. The rolls and over the top and creative, with a laundry list of mayos, salsas (indeed), cream cheeses, teriyaki, tempura and every species of fish and are for the most part quite yummy. The menu offers a varied selection of bento box options that should please anyone, and some traditional Japanese fare if you want to try something new.

Still, Taro's cannot really offer anything unique. It is simply another in the Sushi Trend. Cool, hip, jaunty places with hard metal, smooth lines, and dedicated to the x-treme sushi experience. Some rolls are delicious, others are just odd like the Ceviche Roll, "An inside out roll filled with Fresh white fish, cilantro, lemon zest, and avocado, topped with our famous orange salsa."

The Ceviche Roll is crazy spicy and is something that frustrates every sushi enthusiast. It's too fbig. So big you can't eat it in one bite. It falls apart on your plate making it a chopstick nightmare. There is a limit to sushi. Cramming in so much and being so hyper trendy and cool that the food begins to suffer, but the in-style renegade rolls keep sucking us in. And they may be tasty, but something seems lost to me.

Like that pair of dime store jeans you bedazzeled the hell out of back in the 80's, there is only so much artificial flare you can give sushi.

Nigiri is the epitome of sushi to me, and to a lesser and more pedantic but equally appreciated effect, the California Roll. Straightforward and pronounced flavor. Direct. Pleasing. As sushi should be. Not a mosh pit of ingredients competing to see who gets to beat their flavor into you.

Then there is the seeming sense of production. Each roll has a set schematic. A blueprint. Like the mass developed houses of any burgeoning suburbia, they are cookie cutter. Lacking what seem to be real personality. Lines of sushi chefs producing as instructed.

Where did the love go, that time honored secret ingredient?

Taro's. Dragonfly. Kru. Each are delicious and I am more than happy to dine at them at the drop of the hat. I admit, I adore some of these crazy sushi creations! But it's the places that are unique. Small. Where the care and compassion, the delicate detail that isn't simply trained into the sushi chef for the next whatever x-roll but is rather honed and given attention to each and every delicate sliver of fish.

This sense of the individual. This spirit of flavor for its grand purpose of pleasure, of actually being able to appreciate the fish and not hunt for it under it's chili aioli is gone.

And I want it back.

(Note: The picture above is not of Taro's sushi, it was too dark to get a descent picture. That roll comes from Moshi Moshi, my favorite sushi place in Davis.)

A Warning... (Zokku - Sacramento, CA)

Dear me, dear me, dear me. And after I had found such a lovely sushi place in Davis, I had to go and tempt fate with some trendy poser; tempting me with its anime logo, fancy drinks, and cleverly named sushi rolls. Who is to blame? Myself for wanting to go? Rob for saying he wanted to go to sushi (was that Hell freezing over?). That circus gypsy whose daughter I ran over with a car, and cursed me as punishment? The restaurant for selling an experience they couldn’t deliver? Three of the four reasons are aptly the cause. I think I’m confusing my life with the movie Thinner on the other, but the experience is comparable.

Regardless, let’s break down the night and the meal. Rob, I, and our friend Eric had decided to head out to Zokku, the newest of a line of trendy sushi places. We hadn’t heard much about the place so we figured on giving it the once over. Upon entering we were awe struck. Were we in a Vegas gambling hall? A tacky night club? A cheesy pickup bar? 1985? The strange décor that beats your eyes with a bike chain of try-to-hard trendiess is just… wrong.

Big glass cubes building walls from a 1980’s hair salon, uber chic Ikea lights of all kinds, the bar having big pieces of plastic rock that belong in a Vegas tropical themed hotel pool. It was all smashed together. The red walls were the only things remotely Asian. You would never know it was a sushi restaurant. Had you not seen the menu, Zokku’s choice of cuisine could be interchanged with any other kind of hipster offerings.

Rap music blared out loudly over the restaurant. Not that I mind rap, but not with my sushi thanks. Louder still were the annoying twenty-somethings (yeah, I’m 23, shut up) yelling loudly to be heard over the music. It just makes you eager to leave.

The appetizer, my sushi, and Eric’s tempura all arrived at the same time. Aren’t appetizers usually a first course type of thing? The appetizer of prawns with mango salsa and garlic sauce was really, prawns with strips of mango and honey for dipping. Totally wrong.

The tempura was tempura, you can’t botch it and it tasted damn good. My sushi was fine, nothing fantastic. Another designer roll with sauces, avocado, etc. It was tasty, but nothing you can’t get at every sushi place. 20 minutes later, Rob got his teriyaki chicken. Truly amazing, some of the shibbiest teriyaki I have ever had. If only we hadn’t had to wait for it for 20 minutes.

At one point a waiter came to our table pointed to us and yelled to the other staff “As soon as these people leave I’ll just join these tables up for that big group coming in!” sweeping his hand across the empty tables and us in a dismissive manner. Nice to know we were taking up their valuable space.

The sake section had issues. The sakes were not priced in the menu. I hate asking to know the prices as it makes me feel cheap, which I can be at times but I don’t want to acknowledge it. Our waitress gave me the rundown of the prices and it was all reasonable. No complaints there. What did bother me was her complete lack of knowledge of any of the sake. Her friend she called over to help her out was equally clueless. I dismissed the sake idea and ordered a sidecar. Classic drink; all bartenders should know this one. It was all whiskey and lime juice. The glass was rimmed with sugar and there were cherries and limes in the glass, mocking me.

My friend Megan had a similar experience. She and her dining companion had their plates whisked away without a chance to protest that 1) they weren’t done eating what was on those plates, and 2) they wanted more food, which was not offered as an option. The check was brought to them. Upset, the paid it, left, and went out to another place as they weren’t full. She also noted the drinks were all “glowing lime green things that tasted bad."

My summary: Tacky, loud place with okay food, bad drink, and customers are a nuisance to the people working there.

Zokku
419 J Street
Sacramento , CA 95814
(916) 498-9384

Sushi Sushi (Moshi Moshi - Davis, CA)

Good sushi, as we all know, is hard to find. Like finding a needle in a haystack the size o' yo mama. Seriously, it's a daunting task. You go through nasty California rolls. Sick sashimi. Flacid and mushy edamame. It's a mission filled with pit falls, disappointment, and possibly food poisoning.

But when you find something that works, it's like angels freakin' sing.

That's what I've found at Moshi Moshi. Sure there are great places in Sacramento like Mikuni's and Dragonfly, but let's be honest, the sushi selection in Dixon, Woodland, and Davis is just paltry. Moshi Moshi truly quenches one's thirst in a sushiless desert.

They can be pretty packed, and they may ask your for reservations so you may want to call ahead and make them. If you get there a bit early though I wouldn't worry. I've never been turned away, even when I showed up with four co-workers all without reservations.

We were all wet and cold that day, and were happy with the prospect of bowls of well prepared miso soup and shibby individual pots of green tea, all coming in at $1 each. For an astoundingly cheap price, we were all able to cut the cold right out of us. The brown rice green tea is hit and miss, so you may like it, you may not.

The sushi is varied and innovative, and while time honored staples are present (spider rolls, California rolls, veggie rolls, and so on) a plethora of vivaciously colored and supremely prepared dishes are available. I myself had a spicy tuna roll, known there as the Zero Roll. Big pieces of extremely fresh tuna were rolled with cucumber and topped with paper-thin fillets of avocado. It was all generously served with a potent chili sauce that pointedly delivered blazing spice but not heat; a balance very few restaurants seem to be able to meet.

The sashimi was apparently to die for. My friend Cara seemed to be soley entranced with each bite and had to be roused ouy of a trance so we could gather her opinion. "Wonderful," was her only response before she would delve into the next pink jewel of fish. As an avid sushi fanatic, this approval is golden.

My friend David had ordered the Green Dragon Roll, a decadently sweet unagi based roll. The unagi (eel) had been tempura fried, and while I myself can be picky with it, this was melt in your mouth good. Rich, sweet, and just a little bit salty it almost felt like this roll could qualify as a dessert. The mix of textures from the buttery avocado, delicious give of the rice, and the crunchy soft and slightly oily taste of unagi, decadent sauce and pops of seasame all created a gustatory image that trasnported you to teahouse in Kyoto.

Bento box lunch specials are pleasing as well. For about $7 you score a mixed green salad with a pepper vinegarette, rice, huge helping of your main dish liek teriyaki chicken, and a small 6 piece sushi roll. The potions are filling and leave you pleasantly satiated. Sushi detractors will be happy here as well, as there is enough on the menu to please anyone with an avarice towards raw fish, so feel free to drag them along.

With all sushi freshly prepared, and with such attention to intricate details, you may have a small wait. Nothing horrid, but you may wonder if the chef fell down and broke a hip or something. Luckilly the staff is very approachable so feel free to ask any questions about your order, or if you have yet to order they'll happily guide you through the menu. There's even a board with the most popular menu items, specials, and new menu items to help guide you through your choice.

Overall, Moshi Moshi is, in my opinion, the only place to eat sushi in Davis. They have a new loyal customer as will they with everyone who sits down to a warm bowl of miso.

Update 2/28/07: I still visit this place almost once a week. Still fabulous. Service is friendly and fun. They recently update some of their rolls as well it seems, so go check it out.

Moshi Moshi
2120 Cowell Blvd.
Ste. 143
Davis, CA 95616
(530) 758-8889