Blowfish, Sushi to Die For
2170 Bryant (at 20th Street), 285-3848. Open 11:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. weekdays, from 5 to 10:30 p.m. weeknights, to 11:30 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays. Wheelchair accessible. Parking awful days, chancy nights (try York Street); Muni service via the 27 Bryant.
Fukui
1380 Ninth Ave. (at Judah), 731-2829. Open daily from 11 a.m. to 2:30 p.m., dinner from 5 to 10 p.m. Wheelchair accessible. Parking horrible any time. Served by the N Judah, and the 6 Parnassus, 43 Masonic, 44 O'Shaughnessy, 66 Quintara, and 71 Noriega.
Xiao's Sushi House
3925 Irving (at 41st Avenue), 731-6398. Open Monday through Thursday 4 to 10 p.m. and Friday through Sunday from 11:30 a.m. to 10 p.m. Wheelchair accessible. Parking easy. Served by the N Judah. Free delivery to the Sunset and Richmond.
"Fugu!" exclaimed TJ. "And Fukui too!" I answered. So began our epic Sushi Trilogy, which concluded with TJ yelling, "We found it!" and a haiku appearing spontaneously amid the roe specks on the yellow pad where I was taking notes. (Like any epic, this one begins with an ignorant novice seeking knowledge; it climaxes in a duel between a dramatic young challenger and a taciturn old master appearing from the shadows. If you habitually skip the middles of novels, then proceed immediately to the end of this review to see which sushi bar we found the best. I'll meet you there later.)
TJ is quite a good amateur sushi-maker (not a black belt, but no tyro -- maybe a baby-blue belt). When three sushi bars (that we knew of) opened in one month, he insisted it was time to review some sushi. One new place, Fukui, was a self-evident lightweight, but well-sited a block from the impossibly crowded Ebisu. Another, Xiao's Sushi House, leaving a menu on our porch, was a mystery, far out in the fog -- we called it Sushi X, the unknown sushi-factor. The third, guaranteed success if only by virtue of its name, was Blowfish, Sushi to Die For, located (aptly enough) a few blocks from S.F. General Hospital.
But given my rusty, sophomore-level sushi-tasting palate, I didn't feel ready to do any reviewing. First, I needed to revisit an old sushi master for study. Then I needed to compare all three new sushi bars simultaneously. To review any sushi at all, I needed to sushi-load the way a marathoner carbohydrate-loads.
For the "old master" we chose Ebisu, probably the city's most popular sushi bar, and the one where, a decade ago, I was first awakened to sushi to chew for. In sushi, you want the fish fresh and the chefs seasoned. At Ebisu, the four 40-plus chefs can handle all forms of the art, and each chef tends to several customers exclusively, interactively making suggestions or simply handing you something that will accord with the tastes you've demonstrated in your previous choices. And along with providing dinner-as-entertainment, their creations are evanescent art for the eye as well as for the mouth, little sculptures that you contemplate, admire, and then gobble down. It's religious art in a way, with the aestheticism of Shinto and the non-attachment of Zen.
Arriving at Ebisu early in the evening, there was (as usual) a 90-minute wait for a seat at the bar. We decided to obtain a few basic items from it and from its newcomer-neighbor Fukui as takeout, for a bite-by-bite comparison at home. Fukui proved to be a lovely room, with a miniature indoor Japanese garden (complete with a water wheel), sea-foam-green walls and sunny light-oak tables, room dividers, and a sushi bar, that last unmanned since the sushi is actually prepared back in the kitchen. The dinner menu (which can include a full-course dinner for as little as $5.95) consists of the usual Japanese standards (gyoza, tempura, katsu, et al.) plus some less common appetizers (clam soup with sake, grilled smelt, barbecue short ribs). Sushi prices range from $1.50 to $7.50; five takeout selections cost us $15, compared to Ebisu's $25.
We soon discovered a patent cause of the price difference: We started with my pet sushi stress-test, uni (sea urchin). In low-grade sushi bars, the uni may taste of iodine, and may cause digestive distress at dawn. Fukui's uni nigiri had a small, pale, runny piece, non-iodiny but weak-tasting, compared to the larger, firm, bicolor pink and orange piece from Ebisu, which had a rich flavor like maritime foie gras. Fukui's saba (mackerel) and mirugai (giant clam) tasted as fresh as Ebisu's, but the slices were about half the thickness, and (along with the raw sweet shrimp, amaebi) tasted blander, lacking the sea-breeze undertones of the same species at Ebisu. In addition, while Ebisu's sushi all looked gorgeous, Fukui's were ungarnished. The latter's rice, however, proved signally delicious, dressed with a slightly sweet rice vinegar (where Ebisu's is perfectly neutral). "You've gotta have good rice," said TJ, "because that's half of sushi. The fish won't stand up by itself." Ebisu's scallop hand roll (with bay scallops) was like a raw-fish ice cream cone, with a good mayonnaise dressing; Fukui doesn't make this item, so we tried a New York Roll (shrimp and avocado), pleasant but ordinary. All in all, we found Fukui's sushi adequate as food, peremptory as art. It's a decent fallback if you can't get into Ebisu, can't handle the latter's prices, or place highest value on a serene ambience.
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