Before you guys start raising your pitchforks, hear me out. Like all of you Oishii fans, I’ve been rooting for this restaurant’s comeback. The owner, Thanh Nguyen, is an Asian-American like me. His Pan-Asian sushi restaurant suffered through a fire on December 30, 2012, and it’s taken him almost 10 months to re-open. Nguyen deserves a lot of credit for not giving up. And maybe a couple of hugs, too. He probably knew just how valued his restaurant is to the Dallas community. Oishii fans have been waiting on the edge of their seats for their favorite sushi spot to re-open. When it finally did this past weekend, there was a collective sigh of relief. I could feel the joy emanating from some of your emails and from a few sales girls who work upstairs. Because I grew up in the suburbs (and still live there), Oishii wasn’t on my radar. I’d never eaten at Oishii prior to this Monday, its official opening day. I went, two days ago, because I got caught up in the Oishii fan storm and couldn’t help my curiosity.

I went in with high expectations. From what I’ve heard, the interior is definitely a step-up. Bright, beautiful orange lamps hang from the ceiling, there’s a full sushi bar that can seat up to 18 people, and a salt water aquarium like every other Asian establishment striving for good feng shui. It’s sleek, it’s modern, it’s for yuppies. Owner Thanh Nguyen stood at the front of the sushi bar, making rolls for everyone. People often went up to greet him and congratulate him. He seemed to accept it all graciously. On Monday, it took 15 minutes to get seated for lunch at Oishii. The restaurant was teeming with people. Nobody seemed to want to leave. Everybody wanted to eat. But the menu baffles me. I tend to avoid places that serve three to four different types of cuisine, like Pei Wei. If a restaurant has so many cuisines to focus on, it might not do any of them well. That’s the theory, anyway. Oishii combines Vietnamese, Chinese, and Japanese food into one menu.

The lunch options—beef and broccoli, chicken and broccoli, orange chicken, and orange beef—completely turned me off. The prices are great (everything is under $10), but nothing about the lunch plates I spied at other diners’ tables looked appetizing. So I turned to the sushi menu. Our loyal SideDish photographer, Desiree Espada, and I ordered the Oishii (softshell crab, avocado-wrapped, wasabi cream, and Sriracha), spicy tuna, and the Wycliff (Escola tuna-wrapped, eel, tempura flakes) rolls. All three rolls arrived on one plate. The spicy tuna gave off plenty of heat. I like that chef/owner Nguyen doesn’t shy away from a good kick, but each spicy tuna piece was almost the same size as each Oishii sushi piece, which was a full $6.50 more than the spicy tuna. The sesame flakes in the sushi rice are a nice touch, but Des and I expected more from a roll, like the Oishii, that puts us back $13. Extra fake crab meat on top of the roll just isn’t going to cut it. Especially when the sushi pieces are quarter-sized already.

The sushi was fine. “I didn’t love it,” said Des, who vocalized exactly how I felt. where to get sushi grade fish in winnipegI guess I expected fireworks from Oishii, but all I received was sushi on par with this random hole-in-the-wall called Carrollton Sushi. sushi conveyor belt restaurant torontoIt’s a place you go when you’re looking for cheap sushi.sushi in suhl (2012) So maybe that’s why. sushi delivery london nw8It’s not too expensive. feng sushi discount voucher

People I’ve talked to say that I need to go for dinner. They say it’s a nostalgia thing. sushi fisch kaufen wiesbadenThey have great memories at Oishii. “There’s nothing else really like it in Dallas,” they tell me. Matt Shelley thinks I should’ve ordered the Tribeca roll. (It wasn’t on the sushi menu when I went.) Clearly, I’m missing something about Oishii. I get it, but I don’t get it. I love that it’s a neighborhood restaurant, but all this hype over it is completely mind-boggling. Sushi Nakazawa is a raw delight Never Miss a Story Get The Post delivered directly to your inbox By clicking above you agree to our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy.Chef Daisuke Nakazawa's new restaurant will not serve sushi. WEST VILLAGE —  A chef featured in the movie "Jiro Dreams of Sushi" is opening a new Japanese restaurant on Grove Street — but it won't serve any sushi.

A proposed menu crafted by chef Daisuke Nakazawa — who helms the kitchen at the acclaimed Sushi Nakazawa on Commerce Street and was featured in the "Jiro" sushi documentary — will branch out from Nakazawa's sushi specialties to feature an array of fresh seafood dishes.The menu at the as-yet-unnamed spot at 55 Grove St. combines Japanese and American ingredients and preparations.Prospective dishes for the $125-per-person tasting menu include: fluke carpaccio with white sturgeon caviar, Meyer lemon, seaweed and a Japanese mustard called karashi; a type of Japanese bluefish called Akamutsu with Bordeaux spinach and poached citrus jam; and sea urchin on a "nest" of spaghettini and arugula. Other seafood dishes of the proposed menu include Dungeness crab with roasted pistachio, broccoli and and a citrus-seasoned soy sauce called ponzu; live Maine scallop with creamed butter and blackened chives; and baby octopus with fingerling potatoes, citrus and soured cherry.Nakazawa will also try his hand at non-seafood items, such as an okra and honeycrisp apple salad;

duck liver with strawberry and honey; dry aged beef toast with wasabi, Himalayan rock salt and blackened leeks; and butternut squash ravioli with candied walnuts and Meyer lemon.Alex Borgognone, the restaurateur behind Sushi Nakazawa as well as the new spot, said one of his motivations in opening the new location is to accept walk-ins, in contrast to Sushi Nakazawa's strict reservation-only policy."We wanted to do something a little different, something where people can actually walk in without a reservation," Borgognone told members of Community Board 2's liquor license committee, requesting their support for his application to the State Liquor Authority. "It’s a little bit more of a casual setting, but once again at a high level."The new restaurant will also take reservations, but it will set aside a few tables to accommodate walk-ins. People waiting to be seated will be sent to a bar in the lower level of the restaurant, which can seat up to eight people and will offer the full menu for patrons who decide to stay and eat there.

Borgognone said that while the price point of the new restaurant will be "similar to Nakazawa," he's hoping to make his Grove Street venture family-friendly. He is taking over the whole building at 55 Grove St., though the top two floors will be set aside for office space, with the restaurant on the ground floor and the bar below.Borgognone said nothing will change at Sushi Nakazawa's original 23 Commerce St. location, where diners are offered a 20-course "omakase" — a Japanese term for a chef's choice tasting menu. The menu there changes daily based on the catch fishermen deliver to the restaurant, but has frequently featured such delicacies as a live Florida Tiger shrimp killed directly in front of the guest; eel from salty sea waters off the Japanese island of Kyushu; "torched" Geoducks (a breed of giant clam from Washington State); and large, bright orange Ikura caviar — roe harvested from the ovaries of salmon.The new eatery will be open from 11 a.m. to midnight seven days a week.