by erin thursby scopes1925@msn.com
It seems like Jacksonville sushi houses have sprung up like mushrooms in a fairy ring, with some Jacksonville standbys like Koja’s Sushi opening up second and third locations, to feed those sushi hungry masses.
Speaking of Koja’s, I’ve sampled their sushi at both their Landing location and their newer locale on Baymeadows. I’ve gone back several times, trying to discern what has earned them Jacksonville awards for best sushi. I’ve found the sushi there to be stunningly mediocre. Those looking for a Japanese meal experience ought to know that there is a strong Korean influence as far as other dishes are concerned. The Spicy Pork box, which is described as “sliced pork in sweet & spicy sauce” is more like a Korean curry than what you’d expect at a Japanese restaurant. Locals know to ask for the excellent kim chee, a traditional Korean dish of fermented veggies. The dish is truly for the adventurous diner. Koja’s is known for that dish (which isn’t on the menu) and for their lunch and dinner boxes. At the Landing as well as at the Baymeadows location, they’re a top pick for the local professionals.
Out in Fruit Cove, in Bertram Walk is one of my favorite neighborhood sushi bars, Blue Fin. Since it opened last year in March, I’ve watched the place go through various permutations. When I first tried it, the wait staff was very young and inexperienced, and the mood music made me think of being trapped in a department store elevator. What kept me coming back were the tasty sushi and other dishes they serve. The wait staff improved immensely and the music changed to more traditional Japanese instead of tepid jazz.
Blue Fin’s décor doesn’t stick to the usual sushi house formula, mostly abandoning Japanese touches in favor of a more contemporary, trendy look. The walls are a cool blue-grey, decorated with light fixtures of multicolored angled glass and brightly colored flat tin sculptures of fish.
Most nights, you’ll find owner George Le toiling away behind the sushi bar, deftly shaping the rolls and sculpting the rice. He didn’t always dream of sushi. He went to engineering school in Gainesville and learned sushi techniques while he was in college. He earned his degree, but soon found himself in the sushi business. He opened a restaurant called Sushi Matsuri in Gainesville about 1991, when there was only one other sushi bar there. He knows sushi well, but also has a background in pasta and French cuisine. Because of this, and his Vietnamese heritage, garlic is one of his favorite ingredients. That, along with the standard soy sauce, serves as the basis for many of his savory sauces.
The demand for sushi in Five Points is so high that yet another sushi bar opened up, called Tokyo Bay, just one block from the beloved Sake House. If you haven’t been back to Sake House in quite awhile, you may or may not notice that they’ve expanded considerably since opening, with one entrance on Park Street, and one on Lomax. The owners of Sake House experienced such a demand, even with the renovations and more space, that they were the ones to open up Tokyo Bay. Five Points restaurant-goers are more apt to think of Sake House, and now Tokyo Bay, as a dinner destination than Sushi Café, which has a loyal following. I highly recommend any roll with eel at the Café, although everything else I’ve tried there has been top-quality.
All three of these outstanding Riverside sushi restaurants have their own style and atmosphere. Sushi Café has a very open feel, with blonde wood as the center of the décor. They’ve got a fantastic view of historic brick buildings and the leafy greens of Memorial Park through picture windows At the Sake House, the atmosphere is more dinner oriented, with darker, more lacquered woods. Tokyo Bay is just a tad more formal than Sake House, and has some very private booths toward the back of the restaurant, perfect for a romantic meal, when you want a more intimate atmosphere. Both Sake House and Tokyo Bay have some terrific murals on the wall of Japanese landscapes. At Sake House, you’ll be able to spot them right away, but the more formal Tokyo Bay has it on a back wall.
Many people who haven’t tried sushi assume that it’s all raw fish, but many sushi rolls don’t include any raw fish. Many sushi restaurants now indicate which rolls are raw and which items are cooked. A wonderful “beginner roll” is the California Roll, which includes fish roe, avocado, cooked imitation crabmeat, cucumber and rice. If you’re a bit skittish about the fish roe, just ask to have your roll made without it.
Sushi newbies also need to take their time getting used to wasabi, the green sinus-clearing condiment served with sushi. Try a very small amount at first. You can use your hands to eat sushi but I suggest you use your chopsticks to apply the wasabi. The pickled ginger slices are meant to clear the palate between pieces of sushi but people often pile it on their sushi. When eating sushi topped with fish you should dip the sushi fish side down into the soy sauce to avoid saturating the rice. Letting the rice soak in the soy sauce causes the rice to fall apart and lose its consistency.
Sushi, as we recognize it, has been a popular Japanese snack food or fresh fast food since the 1800s. Sushi wasn’t always served up fresh. As early as 700 AD sushi used to be fermented with rice before being served. With the advent of rice vinegar fermentation times were shortened until eventually it began to be served on rice. Even then, it was generally heavily marinated or salted for preservation. This highly salted version of sushi assuredly didn’t need the addition of soy sauce. Refrigeration made these techniques unnecessary so that today’s sushi is generally free of marinades.
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