SUSHI MORI: $330 WORTH OF SUSHI BLISS ON PICO

My love affair with sushi has been a long and slow process in the making.

I think the very first time I tried sushi in all its glory must have been in my early twenties at a restaurant called Ajimura, close to London's Covent Garden. I recall not liking it terribly much, gagging slightly at both the thought and taste of raw fish and then getting a dose of the heeby jeebys when presented with a bill for the meal which approached £100 (bear in mind this was 1986).

After that, Sushi and I left each other pretty much to our own devices for the next decade or so and it was not until frequent business trips to New York became a part of my life in the late 1990’s, that we bumped into each other again on a regular basis. There was still no way that I would have described sushi as my “go to” meal at this stage, but I at least began to be aware of the finer points of its preparation and to look forward to rather than dread the suggestions of my NYC based friends that we go and prop up a counter somewhere and utter the words "omakase”.

Move on another decade and regular exposure to good sushi in The Big Apple at places like Yasuda and Jewel Bakko, meant that I was now pretty much besotted, an expensive, but unlikely scenario given my first rather ghastly experience.

Back in London, it did and still does prove extraordinarily hard to assuage my all too common cravings. It is not that there are no good sushi restaurants at all in town. There certainly are, but even the best bear little or no comparison to those I have tried in the US, both in the variety and the quality of the fish they serve. They certainly fill a gap, but you can’t help but get the same feeling when eating Sushi in London that you might get watching Brentford vs Rotherham after having just been to The Bernabeu to see Real face off with Barca.

Then came the Japan stage of the EAT MY GLOBE journey and all bets were off. Japanese cuisine, of course, is so much more than sushi, as I found when I went to seven cities and ate as well as I have done anywhere on earth. But, it was a visit to see the auctions at the legendary Tsukiji market and the opportunity to eat a simple meal of glistening tuna on top of a bowl of rice that convinced me that, if I were presented with the opportunity to choose my last meal, sushi, Melton Mowbray pork pies, Fish & Chips and a 20oz 45 day dry aged steak would have t battle it out for the honour of seeing me on my way.

Now I am based in LA, sushi is everywhere. There’s cheap sushi for a quick lunchtime snack, smarter places for the evenings when only raw fish will do and, at the top of the tree there is Urasawa, with only ten seats and where a meal for two costs the same as a small European sports car. Everyone in LA has their favourite sushi spot and arguments about the merits of the fish and rice preparation can rage for hours at a time and bring lifelong friendships to a shouty conclusion.

Last week as I enjoyed a rather good Soul Food meal with my chum, Aaron Tell, who runs the excellent Savory Hunter blog, our conversations turned to sushi. We agreed on a couple of places and disagreed on a couple more. Then Aaron, a resident of Los Angeles for many years, mentioned Sushi Mori. I had never heard of it, but he assured me it was excellent and then we quickly moved on to the more important task of dividing up some freshly fried chicken.

Today, after I had pushed myself through a long run in the gym and Sybil had done enough work from home to justify a break, we both agreed that we had earned a decent lunch. My mind turned back to Aaron’s recommendation and I suggested Sushi Mori as a suitable reward for our hard work. Sybil had never been either and quickly agreed.

Sushi Mori is situated in an unassuming one storey building at an intersection of Pico Boulevard. The large pole bearing a line sketch of a fish is the only clue to the purpose of the small space and inside there are just a handful of tables as well as the obligatory counter.

Once we had taken our seats and ordered the Omakase, Chef Fumi presented us with a small dish of home made tofu topped with freshly grated wasabi and served with a small bowl of house blend soy sauce. It was a stunning start. The tofu dissolved on the tongue and told us enough about Sushi Mori to know that this was going to be both an excellent and a costly meal. We decided that we could put up with the latter because of the former.

Our appetizers continued with the arrival of a slate bearing Japanese eggplant topped with two types of miso and a small dish containing thin slices of rich monkfish liver. The monkfish liver was still a little cold and lacked the unctuous quality it would have taken on had it been allowed to sit a little, but the two cylinders of aubergine were spectacular with a light smoky touch from the torch with which they had been seared.

As if to confirm our positive opinions, the next dish proved to be one of my favourite of the whole meal. A small earthenware bowl, produced by Mori as all the tableware is we were informed, contained an inch of light fish broth flecked out with thin dices of peppers. Poaching in the liquid were slivers of monkfish, tiny clams and the sweetest small shrimps I can recall tasting. The broth had a strong hit of Japanese black pepper, which Fumi told us was because it was a dish usually served in winter.

We were still two dishes away from seeing any sushi at this point and I would have become a little angsty had the next arrival not been quite as special as it turned out to be. Another seasonal dish this time in the form of meat from a Japanese hairy crab, along with its leg, the cholesterol meat and a light, sweet vinegar dipping sauce.

What followed was equally as good. A fresh Abolone and strips of Shishito peppers in a light coating of tempura batter needed no more than simple accompaniments of a few grains of sea salt and a handful of drops of lemon juice to set them off. So often, when I have encountered abalone on my travels, it has been little more than exorbitantly priced tyre rubber. Here, a deft hand with the fryer meant that, while it still required a bite, it will not still be putting up a fight come supper time.

Starters over and done with, it was sushi time. This is the point in the Omakase where we would be presented with bite sized pieces of fish until either Chef Fumi caved or we did. With Sybil in tow and just warming up, I didn’t like his odds, but after eleven (yes folks, count ‘em, eleven) pieces of achingly fresh fish, we had to wave him away.

While none of it was less than excellent, we both had different favourites. Sybil loved the small sweet shrimp caught, we were told, off the east coast. They were also seasonal Chef Fumi explained, going on to say they would only be around for another week. We both “oohed” and “aahed” over two types of tuna and two different types of Yellowtail, but it was the Japanese “Needle” fish, which made my raise an eyebrow. It was a new one on me and brought with it a stronger taste that made me sure to look out for again.

Each piece of sushi came lightly dressed with the house soy sauce and we would have possibly stopped earlier had Chef Fumi not informed us that he had two types of Uni (sea urchin) available. Well, of course, such a boast demanded that we try them both. As our last hurrah, we were presented with two cylinders of Maki Sushi where the rice had been topped by thin discs of both Uni from Japan and from up the coast in Santa Barbara. While the domestic was good, it paled in comparison to its Japanese cousin which melted on the tongue like fishy Space Dust.

And that was it. Well, not quite. Hermano Primero would have been proud to see me polish off both dishes of a subtle ginger ice cream before we called for the bill. When it arrived, we both sucked in a considerable amount of breath. Good sushi never comes cheap, that much I learned during my first meal at Ajimura two and a half decades ago, but the bill at a Japanese restaurant still has the capacity to knock the wind from your sails.

Here, with tip for friendly and efficient service, it came to a whopping $330. That’s about $300 more than we would normally plan to spend on a Friday lunch in case you were wondering how often we splurge like this. But, after a quick readjustment in our seats and after the quick mimed “how F**king much?” gesture to each other, we shrugged our shoulders and handed over a credit card.

We laughed about it on the way home and by the time we pulled into our driveway, we had decided that it was just about worth the cost for a meal of such obvious quality in both ingredients and execution. It’s just as well because Sybil is now only too aware that there are, as Princess Diana put it so well, three of us in this marriage.

The other is my mistress of some twenty years, Lady Sushi and I ain’t letting her go any time soon.

SUSHI ECHIGO: TOP NOTCH SUSHI IN WEST L.A.

“Do you want to have sushi, Honey?”

This is the second favourite sentence I like to hear coming out of my fiancee’s mouth around lunchtime. The first, of course, (get your minds out of the gutter, you filthy lot) revolves around the word “Hamburger” but doesn’t get used so regularly now that I am on a tiny bit of a health kick in the run up to the wedding.

On Friday, a day off for Sybil gave us the chance to spend time together adding a few ticks against a seemingly endless list of “oh, so fun” wedding chores, to brave the stupidly large trolleys pushed by stupidly large, stupidly stupid people at Costco and even head to Venice Beach in search a shirt big enough to hide my middle aged gut for the duration of the ceremony.

As a treat for only whining like a spoiled brat every other breath as I was dragged from pillar to post, my intended decided to buy me a lunch and drove us to an unassuming mini mall in West L.A. She explained that this unlikely location housed one of her favourite sushi restaurants in the city, although she also added that, this meal apart, she was boycotting it because “the prices have gone up and the portions have gone down”. I am definitely marrying the right woman.

Sushi Echigo sits next to a shop selling signs and another, which declared itself a “Healing Center” and while the room was pleasant enough, there was little to suggest that it might offer up more than a harmless diversion of a lunch. Even a sign at the door warning that it only served “traditional style sushi” and the fact that it rapidly began to fill up the moment the doors opened did little to convince me that we should linger and I suggested to Sybil that we just have a quick bite before heading back out to our day’s tasks.

Sybil, of course, knew better, having been there many times before and by the time I had come back from a very necessary journey to point Percy at the porcelain, she had already ticked off more than ten boxes on the printed menu and issued a stern warning that she had requested two orders of her favourite sushi because “sharing is not an option”. As I said, I am definitely marrying the right woman.

Small things told me immediately that this was a notch above most sushi places that I have visited. Even my untutored palate could taste that a small slick of wasabi was fresh, clean and a far cry from the slightly powdery substance I have come to expect back home. Likewise the slivers of lightly coloured pickled ginger had been gently dressed to add a slight sweetness to their sharp natural tang.

A first dish of dainty squidlets stuffed with creamy blue crab flesh and dressed with sesame seeds, confirmed all I needed to know about the quality of Sushi Echigo and subsequent courses kept up the high standards. There may be little new to say about slices of raw fish, but the presentation was thoughtful and unlike some of the sushi restaurants I have tried in the city, the chef was prepared to let the quality of the fish speak for itself with only the occasional light dressing of Yuzu being allowed to get between me and the taste nature intended. Just the right amount of rice was used for my taste and it came at the perfect heat, a notch above room temperature as if it had been recently fanned rather than pre-cooked and cooled.

Star dishes came in the shape of gloriously unctuous monkfish liver and in more of that addictive blue crab, this time served in an attractive hand roll. Both so, well, utterly fantastic that I understood why Sybil was loathe to share and was only convinced not to order more because we had a big supper planned that evening and she pointed out that we (and by "we" I mean "she") had already racked up a bill of a little shy of $100. That’s a lot to pay for lunch, but not when put into context of the cost of good sushi and certainly not for a meal this surprisingly terrific.

While I can certainly fight my corner in declaring that Sushi Echigo would see off all but the very best of what London has to offer, I am sure some L.A. locals, Sybil included, will tell me that there is better to be had at the price, in The City of Angels. I don’t know enough about the place yet to argue with them yet. But, I am going to have a hell of a good time finding out.

HERMANO SEGUNDO LOST IN LA LA LAND: DAY TWELVE

Here is a little warning for any of you who may decided to come and spend some time in LA LA Land. Never, and I mean never start a conversation about sushi. Never.

Bugger me can they bore the arse off you about it and how good it is here and how bad it is in the rest of the world (Japan, anyone?) particularly New York a place with which the people of The City of Angels seem to have a slightly unhealthy fixation and not in a good Mother Theresa “let’s help the poor bastards out because they live in New York” kind of way, more in a Tobe Hooper “let’s skin the bastards alive” kind of way.

So when, Sybil suggested a supper of raw fish after she returned from a day at the office, I quailed slightly at the barrage to come particularly when she told me that her local “joint” Sushi Zo had just been awarded 1* in the brand new Michelin list.

You certainly would not mark it down as a Michelin place from its location in a slightly grim strip mall nor from the room itself, which hardly barked star standard, but the array of fish on display at the sushi station did give a clue that something different was on offer. So too did the announcement of the host, as we sat in front of Keizo, the serious faced owner/chef, that there was no longer any menu being offered, just “omakase” where the choice was to be left to him to keep feeding us until one side gave in.

The quality both in ingredient and execution was apparent from the first plate of sashimi, one of tuna and another of Kampachi (amber jack) and the following small dish of uni (sea urchin) coating a “noodle” made of shreds of squid, but it was the sushi that Sybil was really looking forward to.

Unlike so many places I have visited, where too much cold rice is used to bulk out smaller portions of fish, here the small and correct amount of rice was warm and infused with the perfect amount of vinegar. The texture was correct too, so the fish could be removed and dipped in soy sauce if instructed and replaced on the rice before transferring to mouth by hand or chopstick as preferred.

Few pieces needed added soy as many had received a dressing before serving and the quality of the toro (fatty tuna) was some of the best I have encountered with only a small amount of gari (pickled ginger) needed to clean the mouth before the next offering. If I had one criticism, and I usually do, I would have liked more of the sushi to have been served clean and without dressing so that the exemplary quality of the fish had chance to shine, but this is a minor weakness in an otherwise major experience and the fishy space dust pop of plump salmon roe in a small roll alone would make me forgive any other failings

By the time we had finished our last bite of a blue crab roll (picture of Sybil eating it removed to protect those of a nervous disposition) we had racked up a bill of $165, a lot to pay, but still worth it for sushi of a quality that we could only dream of in London (I will leave the people of New York to state their own case)

So, the people of L.A may well bore the backside off you talking about sushi but, based on the one experience in this neighbourhood “joint” they probably have good reason too.

You have been warned

CHISOU: "NOT TOO BAD AT ALL" SUSHI IN THE WEST END

My friend, Nick put it perfectly

“It’s good, but it’s not brilliant. Then again, that word is reserved for very few places these days”

He is absolutely spot on. These days, “brilliant” is an all too rare exception and the hunt is for “perfectly fine” or “not bad at all”

Shameful given the amount we have to spend on a meal out in London but all too indicative in the shift of power in the quality:cost ratio as punters are gouged for increasingly little return.

On that basis, Chisou on Princes St is a real little treasure. Very decent food at not too stupid a price served by friendly staff, the perfect place for me to celebrate the anniversary of my trip to Japan at the beginning of EAT MY GLOBE.

Alongside set lunches, a la carte sushi/sashimi offerings and the usual smattering of fried dishes, were some of the Izakaya staples which had become favourites on my visit and Nick’s request for me to order for him and his charming, if wilful thirteen year old daughter, Juliette gave me ample room to see if they passed muster.

Basics dishes such as edamame, tempura and pickles were good indicators of a competent kitchen out back and sashimi of tuna and marinated mackerel were signs that they knew what they were doing behind the open counter in the front of house.

Sushi was less impressive with the rice under sea bream and sweet shrimp nigiri sushi being too cold, but a piece of ungagi (eel) glazed with sweet soy was as good as you are likely to find anywhere in London.

It was the Izakaya dishes, which stood out. Tori Karaage (fried chicken) was crispy and the dense flesh strongly flavoured with soy, garlic and ginger. Best of all, the Yakitori, served as requested, two skewers with sauce, two with salt. Both excellent.

Nick was kind enough to pick up the bill of £100 for three of us including green tea and water, which brings it very firmly into the “not too bad at all” category and, in London at the moment, that is about as good as it's going to get.

LIFE: SUSHI BUT NOT AS WE KNOW IT

There was a pleasing circularity in having a Japanese meal tonight on my second night back in London, given that I began the last stage of the EAT MY GLOBE journey in Japan.

Unfortunately, that was about the only thing about tonight’s meal that was pleasing as LIFE on Old St, the latest entry into London’s burgeoning Sushi scene, proved to be a bit of a damp squib.

A shame really as the perma grins of the staff displayed a genuine sweetness that belied their hapless efforts.

Early signs were not good. A simple drinks order prompted eight questions (yes we counted) as the waiter struggled to come to terms with a simple order of tea, soshu and beer and still managed to come back with the incorrect drinks. Added to which, the time between courses would have allowed us to catch up with a couple of series of “24” as we waited and waited and waited for the different stages of our meal to arrive. From time to time, when food did arrive, it was often meant for neighbouring tables and was whisked away before we had chance to pick up a chopstick.

Much of this could have been forgiven if the food had been terrific. Indeed, some of it could be forgiven if the food had been any good at all. But, As HP put it “when you are serving raw fish, there is no place to hide” and in the case of LIFE, clumsy execution and lack of freshness in the raw ingredients were in full evidence.

An appetizer plate of pickled vegetables was not bad at all retaining a crunch and not being swamped by vinegar and a “spring roll” wrapped in shiso was pleasantly crunchy with salmon replacing the unavailable horse mackerel. Edamame, however were over salted and stone cold.

After a long wait a plate of assorted seafood tempura appeared which had been allowed to sit for too long until the batter lost its crunch and the white fish and prawns had begun to turn to mush. This was followed by sashimi of sea bass and sweet prawns that lacked the prerequisite sparkling freshness as indeed did plates of clumsily made salmon skin and spider crab rolls, nigiri of eel, fish roe and scallops which replaced the unavailable sea urchin.

Not dreadful, just flabby and looking as if they had been hacked inexpertly of dull eyed fish making us happy that we had not taken up the option of the more formal Kaiseki tasting menu option.

A visit to the basement of the restaurant saw the discovery of a small shop selling a disparate collection of the bizarre tat that the Japanese seem so fond of alongside a man with rather wild hair standing disconsolately by twin DJ decks as if he was waiting for a party that was never going to happen. One wonders if they had spent more on the fish than on Hello Kitty merchandise if he would have more people to appreciate his skills.

The bill for three of us came to £95 including service which, as I said was beguilingly charming for such an average experience. But, the bar of Japanese food in London has been raised much higher in the last eighteen months and this fell way below what is on offer even just in the environs of Clerkenwell and Shoreditch with places like Edoku, Ginnan, Tajima-Tei, Saki and Matsuri offering better quality at a range of prices.

Unfortunately, I can’t see LIFE having much of a life.