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ReviewOzumo

Page history last edited by Mark P 15 years, 3 months ago

Ozumo Review

 

Ozumo, a Japanese restaurant where we ordered mainly cooked food, was disappointing. We'd endorse only a minority of the dishes, and, while we're generally fairly price-insensitive, we felt the value wasn't commiserate with the price.

 

The bar, however, was happening. Filled a tall, well-dressed financial district crowd and a substantial Asian contingent, it was the type of place one person (we all know) that couldn't make it would have enjoyed. In contrast to the bar's dark wood tones and impressive rows of empty sake bottle above the bar, the dinner area in which we were seated was much lighter (in illumination, the color of the wood, and the decorations), quieter, and more spacious, and had a decent view of the bay bridge.

 

We started with a small plate of edamame (those Japanese pods that you eat the bean but not outside) while deciding what to order.

 

We started with a small plate of edamame (those Japanese pods that you eat the bean but not outside) while deciding what to order.

 

Our first item, slices of hamachi and avocado, was one of the best. It was drizzled with a salty sauce with a little spiciness (apparently from ginger and jalapeno).

 

Second came our tempura-style calamari served with a spicy thousand island-like sauce. The good features of the dish were the high quality of the batter and the fact that the calamari was not greasy in the least; however, the squid was insubstantial / subtle / indistinct compared to the batter.

 

The one uncooked item we ordered was the sushi special of the night. It was merely fine in quality. Sold as an unagi (eel) roll with some other stuff, it turned out to have very little unagi in center and instead larger amount of crab, avocado, and a fish we believe was tuna. We had hoped for a more special unagi-based roll with more obviously high quality fish.

 

The seaweed salad (kaiso salad) we ordered also disappointed. Served soggy with dressing, we said "eh." As one person remarked, the salad would certainly be nothing special without the seaweed. And, frankly, I don't feel the three different types of seaweed really added anything.

 

We also tried a dish of salmon ("marinated in sakyo-miso") with a soy-balsamic glaze. Everyone agreed it was quite good, though one person complained it was ever so slightly overcooked. (I almost made the error of talking my companions out of ordering this dish because we were also ordering a more famous black cod dish with the same marinate. That would have been a mistake.) The risotto the salmon came with wasn't good.

 

Most of us didn't like the black cod we ordered. While it had the same marinate as the salmon, it was very smooth and had a cream sauce that accentuated this feature. Most of us didn't like and couldn't look beyond the focal point of the dish: the smoothness (almost sliminess) of the black cod.

 

Our final entree, shabu-shabu, was the most elaborate dish we ordered that night. At $42, it was also by far the most expensive. It came with a simmering pot of broth (according to the menu: dashi and saikyo-miso broth), a plate of extremely thinly sliced of kobe beef and vegetables, and personal bowls of a dipping sauce. We dropped the beef and vegetables into the broth briefly to cook them; the resulting beef tasted like good quality roast beef. The dipping sauce was also fairly good. (Billed as a daikon radish ponzu sauce, it really tasted like the base was a mixture of apple sauce and soy sauce.) In all, we liked the dish but felt it wasn't worth the money.

 

Throughout the evening the service was mixed. We waited 45 minutes after our reservation to be seated yet there appeared to be tables available all that time. As an apology, when we sat down they gave us each a complimentary piece of black cod. (Good, and different from the one we ordered during dinner.) At times, they were attentive about keeping our teapots full; at other times it felt like we had been forgotten about. Timing of the food was good for the first few dishes, with one being delivered soon after we finished the previous one. But then there was a long gap while we waited for the next dish and then many arrived nearly all at once.

 

I have two things to add.

  • If you go, visit the bathroom. It teaches Japanese!
  • There were little bowls clearly meant for soy sauce, but no sauce on our table or any other table we saw. Yet those eating at the bar had soy sauce. Strange.

 

Total $45/person, counting tax and tip but without drinks. Note that the shabu-shabu cost double a normal entree.

 

Original Announcement

 

As I said once previously, I'm in the mood for non-sushi non-soup Japanese food. Apparently this means Ozumo, a trendy and expensive Japanese restaurant (with a "Robata Grill") near the ferry building.

http://www.ozumo.com/

 

We'll met there at 7:45pm on Wednesday. Tell me if you are coming! (And come expecting that'll we'll entirely avoid the sushi side of the menu in preference for trying dishes that are harder to find.)

 

Comments from Other Attendees

 

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