Archive for December, 2011

Sushi Sushi!

Thursday, December 1st, 2011

Oh Crap! It’s November 29th and that means it’s Applecheeks’ birthday and here I am without a plan. “Dinner!” I thought, “That’s always a good idea.” So I thought back to earlier in the week when she said she had been craving sushi. Now all I had to do was narrow down the search. I didn’t want to break my wallet in half, but figuring it’s her birfday, I may as well do just that. Ignoring cost I searched around for relatively nearby sushi restaurants until settling on Seito Sushi is Dr. Phillips. According to various internet sources, they were pretty good. So let’s go check it out.

We arrived to a restaurant whose sign was unlit, luckily they had a bright blue open sign. We were greeted by one of the nicest hostesses I’ve dealt with in a while. She was polite, made conversation with us, and even put up with our request for a booth. (Even though the booth given to us could have sat 6, sometimes that can put servers at odds with hosts.) After perusing the drink and wine menu’s, I determined this place prides itself on fancy martini’s. Works for me. Applecheeks requested I make a selection for her, I settled on a little number they called Pearl, as I recall, it had pear flavored something with muddled lichi fruit. The few sips I could sneak away from her were very tasty. For myself I wanted a cocktail, specifically the White Flower which contained Bombay sapphire Gin, muddled cucumber, St. Germain elderflower liqueur, lime and soda. I was enchanted with the idea of a liqueur that tasted of elderflower. The aroma was the first thing I tested and let me tell you, it was amazing. With a floral scent and sweet, citrus flavor the drink was mad good.

Next up, we ordered an appetizer. It was the Sumai, a shrimp dumpling served with a spicy ponzu sauce. They gave us the option of steamed or fried, we opted for the crispy texture of fried. This bad boy was ready pretty quickly, I’m always happy to see quick service, not rushed, but quick. Next thing to impress me was the teamwork. “Impressed by teamwork?” you say?  Well yes, it always feels awkward when you have dirty plates on your table or some such and have the other servers/bussers/managers/hosts pass your table because it’s not their job. I’m happy to say Seito was boss in this respect. The teamwork trait was further cemented when I ordered a martini for myself later, (Lava Lamp a fantastic concoction with more of the St. Germain,  Van gogh pomegranate vodka, pama pomegranate liqueur and champagne. Really tasty, a tad on the sweet side so be prepared for that.) The deal with this… the drink had shards of ice chips, a texture and visual choice. The second the drink was created, clock started ticking. If the ice melted, it would taste off and watered down. Here is where the team work came in again. (I got to see all of this by having a good seat in view of the bar.) The bartender himself realized the drink was sitting and would be compromised. He ran it to the table himself AND cleared some of our dishes. Now THAT is awesome.

For dinner we settled on four rolls and Spicy Ginger Pork, which is thinly sliced pork, mixed and cooked in a soy-sesame-ginger blend with sweet sauteed onion served on a hot stone slab. At this point i would like to remind you readers that we were very, very hungry and it was a party, right? yeah… party… Anyway, the pork was quite good, served with a small bowl of rice, I believe was intended to be poured on top of the sizzlin pork. The menu says stone slab but our slab was metal, either way it kept the food hot till we were finished devouring the sushi. Speaking of the sushi! The four rolls we picked (in order of importance) were..

The Distinguished Gentleman: Maine lobster meat, avacado, masago wrapped with steak tataki, the thinnest jalapeno slices I’ve ever seen, wasabi aioli and truffle salt.

My opinion – HOLYCRAPOMG OM NOM NOM NOM. The way the steak added a whole new chew to the roll, along with the meaty mouth-feel of the lobster. Definitely winner of the best roll that night.

 

Mexican Roll: Shrimp Tempura, Avocado, Cream Cheese, Jalapeno, Spicy Mayonnaise and Masago.

My opinion – I am always a fan of crunchy tempura even inside sushi, traditionally a raw seafood ordeal. This roll was on a roll.

 

Spicy Lobster Roll: Spicy Crayfish, Tempura Flakes topped with spicy baked surimi lobster.

My opinion – K, so here’s the deal, surimi, buyer beware, is fake lobster, K-rab style. Surimi in Japanese means ground meat, in this case ground fishmeat. Meaning the lobster shaped nuggets on top were shaped pollack. Not bad, but not lobster. That being said, the nuggets were tasty and the roll was flavorful.

 

Eel: Broiled eel, cucumber and eel sauce

My opinion – Well, it’s an Eel roll. Well executed but overall wasn’t my favorite.

 

On a final note, I’d like to mention the incredibly hip soundtrack we had in our evening meal. We walked in and when I heard Deadmau5 I knew we were in for a good night. Go check it out sushi lovers with a wallet of reckless abandon.

We’re on a roll

Thursday, December 1st, 2011
It was my birthday, and I wanted sushi. Since you should always get what you want on your birthday, sushi is just what we got. We scoped out a few restaurants in the area with varying reviews, and finally settled on Seito Sushi, on the corner of Turkey Lake Road and Sand Lake Road. The restaurant is part of a strip of other restaurants and stores, and doesn’t look like much from the outside. When you walk in, it’s like a modern, urban paradise. The walls are varying combinations of tightly-woven patterns, metals and rich earthy brown tones. White and black also dot the decor and the unique lighting overwhelms everything. Fashionably dim lamps of every shape and color, but all sleek and modern climbed the walls and dividers. All the servers were young, attractive females, and the managers/supervisors seemed like lion tamers, whipping the big cats into shape. I don’t usually like seeing any sort of management happening on the floor, and there were a few comments we overheard about the restaurant and seating that kind of killed the illusion of perfection. I suppose it was a worthy sacrifice for a tightly run ship.We were led to a booth by request (like I said, my birthday, I gets what I wants.) It was wide and comfortable. There were some new fancy drinks on the menu, so we decided to try some of the most popular. I had a Pearl – which was made with Grey Goose, lychee juice, lime and cherry. It was phenomenal. Sweet and smooth, with little bits of lychee pulp that popped in my mouth with the fragrant and floral sweetness that I love in the Japanese fruit. The cherries at the bottom were typical, but my favorite bar-skank past time is tying the stem in a knot with my tongue. Try it, it’s harder than it sounds. 

With my sweet tooth satisfied, we ordered some fried shrimp dumplings. They were priced low at only $4, and gave us a nice start to the meal. They were more fancy tater-tot than authentic dumpling. Lightly fried and gently shrimp flavored, they were small but delectable little balls of what tasted like potato and flour. The dipping sauce was spicy and sweet. Not bad.

We ordered a metric ton of sushi, and even a house specialty dinner – the spicy ginger pork. The pork came with traditional miso soup, which tasted very traditional but well done. The sushi arrived shortly after with the pork dinner as well. I fully expected it to arrive later, so it was a nice surprise.

The sushi looked amazing. Man-Biscuit requested the “Distinguished Gentleman,” which among other things included a thin slice of Waguy beef tar tar on top of a lobster, avocado and cocaine stuffed roll. Okay, maybe it wasn’t cocaine, but I certainly want to inject it into my veins. To put it simply, it was phenomenal, and blew every other roll out of the water.

The others were good, too. The Spicy Lobster roll was filled with lobster and spiced goo, and topped with a pile of crawfish meat which was coated in the same sauce. It was fun to eat and coated with super-crisp tempura flakes that added to the texture.

The eel roll was a little bland. The ordinarily sweet bbq sauce that I am fondly familiar with was lackluster, and the texture was fairly stagnant. However, the eel tasted fresh, and that’s what’s really importnant when dealing with sea-food. I do wish my usually favorite roll had a bit more flair, though. Last but surely not least was the fried shrimp roll. It was perfectly done, with crispy shrimp and lots of blending flavors that were greatly enhanced by the fresh pickled ginger and wasabi soy. Delightful!

When they asked us if we wanted more drinks, Man-Biscuit said yes and requested a “Lava Lamp” for us to share. We also went nuts (despite full bellies) and ordered a Tempura Cheesecake dessert. I am so glad that we did. The Lava Lamp was very sweet and you couldn’t really taste much alcohol – which for a lightweight can be dangerous and fun. There were also perfectly sized icy chips floating in the drink which delighted the throat with coolness and reminded me not unpleasantly of a half-melted Icee from 711.

At last, dessert arrived with a flourish. It was…perfect. Sweet and crispy, fried to perfection. Powdered with sugar, drizzled with chocolate and best of all, sandwiched around a wedge of ice cream. It wasn’t overkilled with sweet, but just perfect. Did I say perfect? It truly was. Order it. It’s worth the $8.

All in all, Seito was expensive, but with good reason. Take out a small loan and come visit this chic sushi joint. You will not regret it.