Ushi Wakamaru

[Todd36]

Had dinner tonight at Ushi Wakamaru, and took notes this time. Hoping to at least provide some frame of reference as compared to Yasuda. Started with the chefs 15 piece sushi selection, which does not come with soup or salad or any rolls, for $49. Selection varies from time to time, and its seasonal. About half of tonight's customers were Japanese business men and many customers were regulars.

1. Pike

2. Half Beak

3. Medium Fatty Toro

4. Yellow Tail

5. White Shrimp, Shio, this is a cooked chopped shrimp that is not the typical red shrimp.

6. Baby White Sardine. This is an almost jelly like mass of several very small fish, served on top of rice with nori, same style as uni often is. Strong flavor.

7. Uni

8. Salmon Roe

9. Baby Sea Eel. Similar appearance to #6, but different flavor. I liked it. Short season they said.

10. Eel. Made fresh, not the packaged stuff. Quite different than Yasuda's version, bigger piece, no bones, less rich I think.

11. Raw Octopus. Good. Not as chewy as last time, which was too chewy for my taste.

12. Live Botan (Sweet Shrimp). Killed in front of your eyes---quite good but not for the squimish.

13. Red Snapper (Tai)

14. Kanpachi

15. Japanese Mackeral. Was told this was like Spanish Mackeral, but imported from Japan. Richer than usual Spanish Mackeral, almost like matjes herring.

A couple things missing that you would normally find in a sushi deluxe (they offer that too, its somewhat cheaper). No rolls, no salmon, no tuna except for toro, no white fish like fluke, no boiled shrimp. I think its quite good for $49, that is about $3 a piece for some non run of the mill things. I asked and they said about half the fish was imported from Japan (doesn't mean it originated from there).

In prior trips, its included, among other things, mastake mushroom, several types of crab, lobster, adult sardine and various mackerel type fish.

[DanaT]

Thanks for sharing Todd.

Looks good, except for killing the shrimp right in front of you.

If the Japanese mackeral is stronger than Spanish mackeral that is one strong fish!

Were you at the bar? How was it served? One at a time or en masse?

[Todd36]

Thanks for sharing Todd.

Looks good, except for killing the shrimp right in front of you. 

At a very famous Japanese restaurant, they twist the claws off of live lobsters right in front of you.....

We were at the bar, but it is a small restaurant, only about 20 or so table spaces, and perhaps 30 or so total seats. Not sure bar verses table matters that much, although serious customers are usually at the bar. They usually serve this 5 pieces at a time...although this time the cooked eel was served alone at the end. By the way, what they list as the special fish of the day on the blackboard is usually most of what shows up in the chef's special sushi, another reason I like the place. $49 for 15 pieces of good and unusual stuff. On Friday, three Japanese business types next to us were getting omakase with no set budget according to checf-owner, seemed to be an upgraded version of what we got, with many shared pieces. Japanese friend guessed the budget was probably really about a $100 a head, but they were regulars, not sure everyone gets the same treatment. They were also sharing a $120+ bottle of sake, which I'm sure also helps.

[jogoode]

Yeah, Todd, thank you very much for the report. The fish sounds very interesting and I look forward to giving the place a shot.

Was the mackerel pickled? I asked because you compare it to matjes herring and I've only had that pickled. I've never seen Spanish mackerel served pickled. It's one of my favorites at Yasuda.

For the sake of price comparison, it's worth adding that Sushi Yasuda offers a set of 12 pieces of sushi for $34, according to menupages.com (details below). (I rarely look at the menu at Yasuda, but will next time I got to make sure this is still offered.) This set includes pieces, like sea urchin, that often don't make it into combinations because they're too expensive.

Please choose 12 pieces of sushi & a half roll

Sushi, choose from: Tuna, Striped-bass, Spanish-mackerel, Shrimp, Sea-scallop, Salmon-roe, Yellowtail, Sea-bass, Rainbow-trout, Squid, Freshwater-eel, Flying Fish-roe, Kanpachi, Sea-trout, Pompano, Cherrystone-clam, Salmon, Egg-custard, Fluke, Snapper, Mackerel, Orange-clam, Sea-urchin

Rolls, choose from: Tuna-roll, Salmon Skin-roll, Radish Sprout-roll, Yellowtail-roll, Freshwater Eel-roll, Pickled Radish-roll, Salmon-roll, Cucumber-roll, Sweet Squash-roll

2 pcs maximum per item

[Todd36]

The mackerel was vingered, not sure it was fully pickeled. Mackerel in sushi is often vingered, in fact its got a name, "Shimesaba" means vingered mackerel.

I wouldn't swear what kind of mackerel this was----Japanese dining friend was told it was Spanish Mackerel, from Japan. Given that there are probably one hundred mackerel species that can be made into sushi, some of which are pretty similar, who knows if the chef knows exactly what kind it is, much less is there a special Japanese name for it, much less can anyone translate it into English. It was probably something similar to Spanish Mackerel, but could have been different fish. Even in Japan, they are not always so exact..... people in Japan will order "white fish" and depending upon the season and who knows what else, you'll get some kind of white, non-fatty fish. Ushi Wakemaru also sometimes serves something fresh killed, won't go into details, and the Japanese translation into English is the very unhelpful "flat fish." I can tell that by looking at it, looks like a flounder---but there are hundreds of species of fish that look like that----at least in Sushi, it appears they do not distinguish among flat fish species---and yes, my friend is a native speaker.

The Yasuda combo deal is not directly comprable. I noticed it when I was there. For example, the eel in Yasuda's combo is pre-pack eel (the key word is "prepared" on the menu). It's not the best stuff Yasuda has to offer. Uwash Karmaru (gotta learn how to spell that) included more exotic and expensive stuff in that $49 combo. This is what I mean by at least based on what's on the menu, Yasuda's selection while large, wasn't exotic. Possible Yasuda has off menu stuff. Time to learn Japanese. Like the time I ordered sharku at Sushi Seki---not something I'll do again....that's mantis shrimp by the way.

[DanaT]

Interesting about the pickled mackeral. I haven't had any. I'll have to ask my friend Chikako.

BTW I just lurked a bit in the Japan forum and read about there being two culinary regions so to speak in Japan with very different histories and customs.

I wonder if the definition of traditional Japanese changes depending on what area in Japan the speaker is referencing.

[Todd36]

My close dining friend is from Tokyo, but she is so food oriented that she knows Japanese regional food pretty well. Some of my other friends are from Kumomoto.

I think mackerel is traditionally vingered or pickeled becuase of health concerns with parasites.....

Curious to see what your firend says.

[jogoode]

The Yasuda combo deal is not directly comprable.  I noticed it when I was there.  For example, the eel in Yasuda's combo is pre-pack eel (the key word is "prepared" on the menu).  It's not the best stuff Yasuda has to offer.  Uwash Karmaru (gotta learn how to spell that) included more exotic and expensive stuff in that $49 combo.  This is what I mean by at least based on what's on the menu, Yasuda's selection while large, wasn't exotic.  Possible Yasuda has off menu stuff.

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The Yasuda combination offers nothing other than the fish Yasuda serves on the menu--that is to say, the "best". To say that this is not "his best" because it's not exotic is silly. Eating sushi is not a contest for exoticism. And if you need something exotic you can use the $15 difference in price to choose something that fits that bill. (Yasuda offers off-menu items, like organs and other odd parts of fish; I once had abalone liver.)

I'm not certain, but I don't think "prepared" eel indicates that the stuff is purchased pre-packaged. I've downed a procession of different eel preparations there and every piece was superior, and Yasuda claims not to use pre-packaged stuff at all. Your claim that Ushi Wakamaru offers "more expensive" stuff in its combination is hard to accept because prices of fish are relative to the price each sushi-ya pays. I think you'd agree that Masa pays more for akami (lean tuna) than Ushi pays for baby sea eel.

Arguing about sushi is so much fun!

I don't have my Japanese dictionaries right now, but I've also seen the Romanization of the Japanese for mantis shrimp spelled "shako", in case anyone sees it and wants to order it. I like mantis shrimp; the texture is strange, almost granular.

I hear what you're saying about Japanese names of fish. When I order I sometimes try to use Japanese names, all of which I get from reading my sushi dictionaries, including one that I picked up online after noting the title of the book that the chef at a well-regarded Tokyo sushi-ya took out when trying to explain what fish he was serving to me. Sometimes the chef thinks it's funny that I know the Japanese for some obscure fish but can't say anything else in Japanese; other times he laughs at me for using some general term that doesn't apply to what he's serving.

[Todd36]

Prepared eel is the pre-pack stuff, its about half the price of what is described as "fresh" on Yasuda's menu. I don't know what he told you, but its plain and clear on the menu: he offers pre-pack eel. So does Ushi Washwakmaru. We thought about ordering the combo at Yasuda, and looked very carefully at the combo pricing. It's generally the cheaper stuff from the ala carte menu and isn't that much of a bargain. In that sense, it isn't his best fish and its not comprable to Ushi's 15 for $49 special.

Sure, its fun to argue about sushi and I do have a long term plan to solve this problem.

Bar Masa is not getting its fish from a good place, or they mishandle it, based on my experiences there. I have not eaten at Masa itself. Masa has overhead costs per consumer that are probably several times that of Ushi or Kuruma or most other sushi places in town. I wouldn't conclude that Masa's high prices are all going to towards better fish. At a certain point, there is also a question of diminishing returns. As the owner of a three star sushi place told me, he's not sure how many people, including sushi chefs, can distinguish between the most expensive fish on the market and the close to the most expensive fish on the market.

[Orik]

Todd,

I've eaten at Yasuda many times, probably fifty or sixty, almost always Omakase at the bar, which is typically around 20-30 pieces. The food price per person has always been in the $90-$160 range, depending on what's available and how much we pig out. Having eaten at Ushiwakamaru a couple of times, I can say that it is a great deal for the price (compared to other places offering 15 pieces for $50), but if you eat 25 pieces there, the price starts scratching Yasuda (and that's without live uni or anything of the sort). While the fish at Ushiwakamaru are of very good quality (except for shrimp they used in Chawanmushi I had there once, which was bad) and the preparation of nigiri is quite good, the rice is nowhere nearly as good as at yasuda and control over wasabi levels could also use some help. I do accept your claim that the "combination" deal is better at Ushi , but Yasuda is still serves overall much better sushi.

[mascarpone]

Where is this place located?

What is the telephone number. I looked it up on Menu pages and, for some reason, struck out.

[jogoode]

Here's the info and (shameless plug) my review.

[mikeycook]

Robert Parker voted Ushi Wakamaru as one of his top meals of 2005.

[ned]

I really like this restaurant. I like how relaxed the atmosphere is in relation to the quality of the food. High quality fish. And lots of interesting things. A fellow sitting next to me on my last visit has been eating chef (and ownerI think) Hideo's food for 16 years and recommended many things, among them a kind of preserved miso that reminded me of the weird Norwegian cheese called gjetost. Chef cuts some nice sticks of a long skinny cucumber with which you scoop the miso kind of like eating peanut butter with celery. I asked what form it came in, if you buy it as it is or if chef had done something with it and he laughed and said that the chef's mother had made it. Fabulous. They, like Seki are serving a Wagyu beef sushi although here it is seared where Seki's is raw. Still sublime but not quite as much so as Seki's. Also he had mackerel roe and some spicy cod roe. As you can see I've recorded none of the Japanese words for these items but they all did go in my belly.

The price point is amazing. And it's a block from Pegu Club as well as a fantastic Qi Gong place on Sullivan allowing my wife and I to complete what we call the "trifecta."

[raji]

Haven't been in a while, so I'm hoping Hideo remembers me as we were introduced by a mutual friend... does anyone know if it books out early? Was going to call first thing tomorrow to get 3 @ the bar for Thursday night...

[zEli173]

Haven't been in a while, so I'm hoping Hideo remembers me as we were introduced by a mutual friend... does anyone know if it books out early? Was going to call first thing tomorrow to get 3 @ the bar for Thursday night...

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Shouldn't be a problem.

[LPShanet]

Haven't been in a while, so I'm hoping Hideo remembers me as we were introduced by a mutual friend... does anyone know if it books out early? Was going to call first thing tomorrow to get 3 @ the bar for Thursday night...

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[raji]

Just bumped it from 3 to 4 people. Man this is going to be a feast. It's part business so I can't take any food porn, but I'll try to report back as it would be good to know there is truly authentic sushi in that neighborhood....

[foodhunter]

I'm anxious to hear how it goes. I've been there once, and I wish I liked it more. The price point is definitely good, and the quality is most certainly a cut above the average, no-name, corner joint. But it's always perplexed me why Ushi is so often compared with some of the higher-end spots. The fish quality is there, but I've always felt it isn't always just about the freshness and variety of the fish.

[Fat Guy]

Clearly people are having highly divergent experiences at Ushi. Before going there, I'd heard everything from characterizations of the place as "just above average" (pretty much Frank Bruni's one-star assessment) to "on par with the best sushi anywhere."

My experience was in the latter category. The omakase dinner I had at Ushi -- and we weren't even in Hideo-san's territory but, rather, were taken care of by the younger of his two capable colleagues -- was as good or better than the best I've had at Yasuda, Kuruma, etc.

I thought the rice was spot-on flavor-wise, and the nigiri pieces were nice and loose. The assortment of fish was quite broad, with a few I'd never seen before. A few of the pieces were best-I've-had level and all the rest were excellent, except the uni, which I thought wasn't top-notch. Hideo is getting amazing toro, and also does a nice trick with soy-cured Copper River salmon, which tastes like a cross between lox and tuna.

Ushi is a very different kind of restaurant from the minimalist, serene places that dominate the category of top sushi bars. It's energetic and eclectic, very much the personal domain of chef Hideo. While the food is traditional, the attitude is rebellious -- one gets the sense that, as in the satirical video, everyone working at Ushi really does have a secret past.

We stayed after dinner and chatted with Hideo for a couple of hours, as he regaled us with stories and opinions. Hideo's English is not great, but luckily I had Raji along to translate in both directions.

Hideo trained in Tokyo under the then-80-year-old master Sadao Maneyama, the author of an authoritative sushi text and the owner of the sushi restaurant chain Kintaro. He also worked for Sushiden in Japan, hoping for a transfer to New York (Sushiden operates in Manhattan as well as Japan), because he had developed, after traveling to Hawaii and Los Angeles, a sense of mission about bringing his interpretation of traditional sushi to America. Sushiden never transferred him to the US (then again, he reflects, he never thought to ask directly), so he moved on to Chinzan-So, which was in the Four Seasons Hotel Tokyo and was also opening “New York Chinzan-So.” The so-called New York Chinzan-So (much to Hideo's surprise) was not in New York, however, but in New Jersey, overlooking the Hudson in Edgewater. Eventually, nine years and seven months after arriving in New Jersey (during which time he had opened the first Ushi Wakamaru), he finally opened on Houston Street in 2003.

To me the most striking thing about Ushi -- the thing that hit me the second I sat down -- is the design of the sushi counter. Most sushi counters follow the same design scheme, with a glass fish-display case standing between the chef’s workspace and the customer eating area. Hideo says he has never liked that arrangement, because the glass case blocks the customer’s view of the chef’s hands. I agree. For Ushi Wakamaru, Hideo engineered a custom sushi bar that keeps the food preparation in full view: the chefs’ work area is elevated and the cutting surfaces are at the customers’ eye level. The sushi display cases cascade down and towards the customers who eat from a counter approximately a foot below. When the chefs need fish, they tilt the display-case doors towards the customers and reach in from above. As a customer, one sees every cut, every move, every specimen of fish. Reaching in from above is also advantageous for refrigeration purposes.

There are all sorts of other great little touches: the staff are, at least for now, wearing traditional summer kimonos; many of the platters and other service pieces are rough-hewn, rustic and offbeat; when you order sake you're offered a choice of ceramic cups out of which to drink it; there's a traditional wooden sign above the sushi bar listing the available fish (with modular wooden inserts that can be knocked out when an item runs out); toothpicks come after the meal wrapped in little origami pouches.

I guess all I can say is go, sit at the sushi bar and order omakase. If Ushi isn't your speed, so be it. For me, it's the new favorite, not just because it's cheaper (the two omakase options are $70 and $100, which is about half the Midtown rate) but because of its personality, all the little touches and the fact that the place just feels right to me.

Here's the man, Hideo Kuribara:

[raji]

After a period where I didn't have a clear favorite, I have to agree that Ushi is now my favorite Manhattan sushiya. Where it is technically the "best" is debatable - if it wasn't a bit of a "find" and became more popular, would it be able to scale up? And if you do go there to spend a TON of money, similarly, is there a glass ceiling? I say the answers are "yes" and "no"...

Someplace like Masa or Kuruma or Yasuda to a certain extent, they're like that 6 foot hot blonde - they might technically be more attractive, but you don't get to hang out with her all that much. Ushi is someplace I can go on a more regular basis, and not just because of the cost.

Most western restaurants, you know how much you're going to need for an app, entree, dessert and a glass of wine, meanwhile at a sushi bar you can spend a certain amount of money in 2 different ways and be starving or stuffed.

I guess I would assign which is best in given cost ranges, I do this in Tokyo too. If I have $30 to spend, I'm not going to go to a sushi bar that is normally $150 per person, I will go to an outstanding kaitenzushi, but that same place would not be appropriate if I'm spending 5 times that.

Here's the approximate order and what we had - I'm missing about 3-5 pieces.

_Sashimi_

Tako

Saury

Abalone

Otoro

Kanpachi

_Sushi_

Red Snapper

Shimaaji

Soy Cured River Salmon

Soy Cured Tuna

Otoro

Saba

Sannma

Uni

Ikura

Aburiengawa

Anago

Negitoro

[LPShanet]

After a period where I didn't have a clear favorite, I have to agree that Ushi is now my favorite Manhattan sushiya. Where it is technically the "best" is debatable - if it wasn't a bit of a "find" and became more popular, would it be able to scale up? And if you do go there to spend a TON of money, similarly, is there a glass ceiling? I say the answers are "yes" and "no"...

Someplace like Masa or Kuruma or Yasuda to a certain extent, they're like that 6 foot hot blonde - they might technically be more attractive, but you don't get to hang out with her all that much. Ushi is someplace I can go on a more regular basis, and not just because of the cost.

Most western restaurants, you know how much you're going to need for an app, entree, dessert and a glass of wine, meanwhile at a sushi bar you can spend a certain amount of money in 2 different ways and be starving or stuffed.

I guess I would assign which is best in given cost ranges, I do this in Tokyo too. If I have $30 to spend, I'm not going to go to a sushi bar that is normally $150 per person, I will go to an outstanding kaitenzushi, but that same place would not be appropriate if I'm spending 5 times that.

Here's the approximate order and what we had - I'm missing about 3-5 pieces.

_Sashimi_

Tako

Saury

Abalone

Otoro

Kanpachi

_Sushi_

Red Snapper

Shimaaji

Soy Cured River Salmon

Soy Cured Tuna

Otoro

Saba

Sannma

Uni

Ikura

Aburiengawa

Anago

Negitoro

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Nice. Guess I'll be seeing you guys there. And just to cover the bases, I'll be bringing at 6 foot hot blonde.

[raji]

I should also add, that if opinions diverge and there's a question of consistency,

I'll be back Thursday night, and this time in front of Hideo-san, so I'll post again.

As FG remarked, we were even in front of, essentially, the 3rd string quarterback, and did as well as we did. Needless to say I'm looking forward to Thursday night.

[alwang]

As luck would have it, I was at Ushiwakamaru this past Friday for dinner, and I was also seated in front of the youngest chef (seniority at Ushi appears to be inversely correlated with relative hirsuteness )

A quick caveat, I have not eaten at the top tier of NYC sushi spots: Yasuda, Karuma, or Masa. That said, Ushiwakamaru was some of the best sushi I've had. My dining companion and I both ordered the $49 15-piece chef's selection, though I requested a sushi/sashimi mix while her's was entirely sashimi. Some highlights include the ikura (best I've ever had), the uni, and the small glass shrimp. The only disappointing items were the tarban (overpriced, underflavored) and the tuna. I guess they don't trot out the best toro for the $49 menu, but this wasn't even *good* tuna: no fat content, and a weird cut with a lot of connective membrane.

I would definitely go with the sushi/sashimi mix versus all-sashimi. The rice is quite good, and I thought the slices of sashimi were a little undersized.

Edited August 6, 2007 by alwang (log)

[raji]

What time were you there? me and FG were there late like 10:30