A place opened up here a few months ago called Sano Sushi Never had a good chance to go till today with my friend Robert.
I wonder if they will let me sleep in the parking lot…
It is an all you can eat Japaneese food buffet, about 40 different sushi items available plus a variety of other items (tempura shrimp and veggies, and the chefs just keep cranking them out as the customers take them…
We both ate so much we damn near crawled out of the place. $30 including tip for more sushi than I have ever eaten before. We have stuffed ourselves almost as silly at our prior sushi source for about $60.
Tell me where it is. I must make a holy pilgrimage to this Shrine of Fine Japanese Cuisine. I have subsisted too long on that which Montanans call sushi, and it resembles bait and soggy grass.
The best sushi I have ever had was in Vienna, and it is a place the locals visit (menus are in German and Japanese only) because it is obviously run by Japanese people who really know their traditional food. This follows the two of the main Rules for Picking Restaurants:
[ol]
[li]When outside your hometown, eat where the locals eat.[/li][li]When looking for ethnic food, find restaurants run by members of that ethnic group.[/li][/ol]When I ate there, it was good food en masse: Any single course could easily have been a light meal at another sushi place. While the focus was on the traditonal sushi, we (my friend/guide and I) also had excellet tempura and kim chee (Korean spicy pickled cabbage)*. The restaurant served the best sushi sauce I have ever had: a guacamole-horseradish mixture that was sweet, grainy, and very, very spicy. The restaurant reminded me why I like sushi, and I have never found the like back in The World. A true American sushi place would be, quite simply, a victory for good food in the western hemisphere.
*I have since found kim chee in my hometown. It is a pale, cabbagey imitation of the real thing. Kim chee should clear out your sinuses and set fire to your tongue, not just elicit a vague tingling sensation like flat soda.
I bet I know how to please her too! those little squares of ghiradelli chocolate fit the bill nicely don’t they.
You could just pick the yummy fish part off and toss the rice!
Unfortunately for most dopers its in Fresno, Ca. I have heard of a similar place in San Francisco but never been there.
If we ever have a FresDope we should have it here!!
Details…
Even the iced tea was great! It was like some kind of yummy fruit tea
They had yellowtail and some utterly wonderful tuna. A very pale pink toro that melted in your mouth like warm butter. I can still feel a little “full” sensation right now even though it was 18 hours ago. Unagi was good even though I prefer it served warm. Excellent sauces too.
For those of you who are sushi-starved in the frozen north (AKA Minneapolis-St.Paul and vicinity), I have heard that Saji-Ya in St. Paul has great sushi.
I’m a new convertee to sushi (this summer) and have, thus far, only sampled Marshall Field’s wares from their basement cooler. I pronounce it El Yummo.
There used to be a kickass pasty place over here in Monroe County (Flat Rock), but they closed down. Major, major sadness. Nothing beats pasties on a cold, snowy day like today.
Athena, I move that you come downstate to a MichiDope and that you bring dozens and dozens of frozen pasties with you. I like the beef ones best. Thanks.
Oh yeah, sushi. I hear there are a few good places in Ann Arbor. Any natives wanna point me in the right direction?
Hey, if she wants to go completely topless, I’m OK with that.
My biggest recent culinary orgasm was at an Italian restaurant in NYC in August (can’t remember the name right now, but I’d have no problem finding it again) where I had lobster ravioli.
Damn, now I want some. And I won’t be back to NYC for another month. And the DC-area restaurants that I’ve Googled that have it, seem to be outrageously expensive.
those little squares of ghiradelli chocolate fit the bill nicely don’t they.
Nothing beats pasties on a cold, snowy day like today.
