Sushi Luxe

June 01 2005 - 11:40 AM

In Andersonville (the ANDER in Andersonwater Park) there are tons of restaurants that seem to open and close with such regularity that it’s hard to keep track.

Sushi Luxe wants to be and probably is the local trendy sushi place and where that doesn’t immediately bother me the beat centric techno in a dining room with only 3 tables seated does. A metronomic thump in an otherwise quiet environment is quite annoying.

Sooner or later someone has to break it to the sushi-restaurant-owning
population… Godzilla rolls or firecracker rolls are not unique. They
may be to a traditional sushi  restaurant but to the hip USA sushi crowd
they are an expensive (in the Godzilla case) mainstay. At Sushi Luxe I did see some
interesting specialty rolls and the sushi was very tasty.

We actually ordered 2 rounds starting with yellowtail sashimi that was
firm moist and flavorful. After our sojourn to Katsu I think I tend to
appreciate the lighter and less bouncy castle for sale flavorful common yellowtail. However
with salmon that taste changes. I ordered several salmon pieces as well
as a fatty salmon piece that came wrapped in seaweed horizontally (like
king crab). I immediately appreciated Torajiro’s salmon. Where here the
standard salmon was flavorful, the fatty salmon was way butterier and
reminded me of Torajiro’s standard salmon pieces.

The pieces overall are sliced thin and long. We also ordered flounder
which is usually served with ponzu or a pickled radish but here was
bare and the comment was that it needed something.  Scallops, chopped
and baked in the shell with a spicy mayo and tobiko, were hard to eat
but very enjoyable. Shitake spring rolls were actually spring rolls – I
was hoping for a shitake spring-roll-roll… if you catch my drift.
They could slice them maki style and it would pick it up. The sugar
sweet shitakes were excellent with a squeeze of lemon and some
(assuming) dumpling sauce.

We filled in our meal with white tuna, spicy tuna that reminded me of
BBQ potato chips (in a good way), tempura tofu rolls which were bland
as expected with a nice sweet dark sauce, a wonderful scallop
piece that was split and baked, served with more BBQ sauce… (same as
the previous scallop dish and the spicy tuna) and the old tuna avocado
roll standby.

For $4 I jumped at a saketini and got a sweet red punchy thing (lychee? There was no description on the menu) that packed absolutely no punch whatsoever.
Not what I expected but it is summertime.

Overall I would be happy to return and try some new things off the
menu. The fish was good and the service attentive but nothing blew me
away and to maintain a “trendy sushi” place you need to take more
risks… I hope they stick around.

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