Bonus: Simon Sushi (2.0 km)

Hey, long time no sushi!

I'm not sure when or if I would've gotten as far as Simon Sushi on Spadina for Sushipalooza proper, but it's not so far away. Definitely one of the 100 closest sushi places to my house.

I built my meal at Simon Sushi by selecting a few of their alarmingly cheap maki rolls. The "Yonge Roll" featured tempura shrimp and pickled daikon radish or whatever that yellow stuff is. The "U of T Roll" had eel and avocado and cream cheese. What's that you say? Sounds weird? It was.

My favourite of the rolls was the promisingly named "Tropical Delight". I don't even remember what was inside, but it had mango on top. You can't go wrong with mango on top.

So yeah, Simon Sushi: pretty decent quality sushi at crappy sushi prices, which equals a bona fide bargain!

Does this writeup seem a little half-assed, after all these months of silence? So sue me. I'm tired. Goodnight!

Bonus: Sushi Queen Izakaya (1.0 km)

If you've been following Sushipalooza since last year (why??), you may recall the sad tale of Mochizuki, which went out of business just before I got around to visiting it. Well something new has finally opened up in it's space. Is it a coffee shop? A haberdashery? A Kinkos? Heavens no, it's another sushi place!

Well actually a sushi place / izakaya, because izakayas are the hot food trend of summer 2010. Sushi Queen Izakaya an offshoot of the popular (I think) Sushi Queen on Queen St., but with some extra izakaya-y stuff on the menu. Also some additional wacky maki rolls. I love wacky maki!

But first I got started with some wakame seaweed salad which much like any other wakame salad I've had (i.e. good). Then from the izakaya menu, a bacon enoki roll, which is exactly what it sounds like, assuming it sounds like enoki mushrooms wrapped in bacon and grilled. And also assuming it sounds tasty. Which it was.

As it happens, Sushi Queen Izakaya is right up the street from the ill-fated Tatami Sushibar (still closed by the way, and still scattered with remnants of lunches left by fleeing diners), and they've really stepped in to fill the void in over-the-top presentation. Complete with a glowing bowl of sprouts in the middle of my plate of Paris Rolls. The rolls themselves were pretty good too; like inside-out spicy tuna and salmon rolls topped with lobster salad.

But personally I preferred the Hawaiian Roll, which incidentally contained neither ham nor pineapple. Instead it was tempura shrimp, crab stick, cucumber and tobiko in a rice paper wrapping. Oh and mango I think. Was there mango? I forget. Well it was good either way. (Ed.: No mango, but salmon. Good thing I take pictures to refresh my memory!)

Sushi Queen Izakaya doesn't have the same fun atmosphere of the perpetually-packed Guu (which moved into Sushi Plaza's old digs a few months ago), but it does have some pretty decent food. And if you hustle, it's 20% off until the end of July, or something like that.

Bonus: Tokyo Kitchen (0.9 km)

You know, I'm not entirely sure why I didn't visit Tokyo Kitchen last summer during Sushipalooza proper. It was sitting right there, across the street from Masa on Charles St. Surely I couldn't have overlooked it while scouring the neighbourhood for sushi joints, and even if I did, I have a chat record of my friend telling me about it in the middle of the summer.

So I can only assume that I must have disqualified it for not primarily being a sushi restaurant. Which it's not; they do serve sushi, but it's buried at the back of the menu, behind pages of noodles, teriyakis, and Japanese curries. I probably could've made a case for including it, and certainly could've used it as an "extra"... but I didn't. And of course I have no recollection of any of this.

But enough about my failing brain. Let's talk about Tokyo Kitchen. Unfortunately, I forget the names of most of the dishes I ordered. Failing brain, you know. Whatever this is called, it's a deep-fried skewer of pork belly. It was OK I guess.

Still with the appetizers, and still deep-fried: little nuggets of chicken breast in a light batter that the menu claimed was soya sauce flavoured. Not pictured: my dining companion's seaweed salad -- not the usual wakame, but something featuring noodles and seaweed in a thick and rather sticky sauce. Much more appetizing than that sounds, I promise.

All right then, on to the main course. I had a beef curry with potato croquettes. The curry was much milder than, say, an Indian curry, but quite yummy. The croquettes weren't bad either. Nice crispy coating and all, though basically just mashed potato inside, a little bland on its own. Good thing I had all that delicious curry to eat with it.

Aw, how did I not get a picture of dessert? It was pretty nice: ice cream and fruit and little cubes of some sort of gelatin stuff. Must've slipped my mind. Sigh.

As I think I demonstrated over the course of Sushipalooza, Yonge St. has a whole lot of cheap sushi restaurants. What it doesn't have so much of is actual Japanese food. If you're looking to move beyond the maki, perhaps you should give Tokyo Kitchen a try. It's hardly hiding at all!

(Someone was complaining recently that I never put restaurant addresses in my posts. That's because I'm too lazy to make a note of them. But Tokyo Kitchen is on Charles just east of Yonge, on the ground floor of the TPA garage.)

Update: Tatami Sushibar

You may recall a few weeks ago I checked out Tatami Sushibar at Yonge and Gould. Hey, I wonder how things are going for Tatami?

Uh-oh, this can't be good for business. Part of the wall above the restaurant collapsed in the middle of lunch time yesterday, causing quite a mess but apparently not injuring anybody. Today they had a demolition crew out there, pulling more of the building down before it came down on its own. The end result was a large pile of rubble (mostly) outside the restaurant.

Yeah, so looks like Tatami might be closed for a few days. Or much much longer, depending on the state of that building. Ouch.

Special: Golden Maki, Newmarket ON (52 km)

I'm clearly out of practice with this whole sushi-blogging thing, because I forgot a key part of the process at Newmarket's Golden Maki; I didn't get a picture of the outside of the place for the header. Oops. And it's so new I can't even steal a picture from Google Streetview. Oh well. It looks like a sushi restaurant in a suburban strip plaza.

At least I remembered to take pictures of the food. Like this "teriyaki maki" thing... at least I think that's what it was called. That's what it should've been called, anyway. It was enoki mushrooms wrapped in grilled beef. Sound good? It was.

Appetizers dispensed with, we dug in to our maki course. The Rainbow Roll was pretty good, but the real hit of the meal was the "Golden" roll. It's beyond me why more places don't serve rolls with mango. It was mangotastic. My dining companions very nearly came to blows over the last piece.

But we're not done with the maki yet. Next up was the Vegetarian Dragon roll. What a silly name, everybody knows dragons are princessavores. Name notwithstanding, it was a pretty nice roll, especially if you like tempura yam. And who doesn't?

But to heck with dinner, I only judge a sushi place by the quality of their desserts. And get a load of this deep-fried mango ice cream! Yeah, that's right, more mango. You wanna fight about it?

Newmarket isn't quite as thick with sushi joints as downtown Toronto, but between Solo Sushi Ya and now Golden Maki, you should be able to find something worth eating up there. So quit complaining.

Bonus: Tatimi Sushibar (0.9 km)

More than anything, this is a story about the oblivious haze in which I live most of my life.

Yesterday I was walking down Yonge St., and I was surprised to see a new sushi restaurant which I'd never noticed before. Now this kind of thing happens fairly frequently in Toronto, where sushi restaurants spring up with astonishing regularity, but I've walked past that intersection numerous times in the past few weeks -- including the night before -- and had never noticed any new sushi restaurant, or even a "coming soon" sign. It was as if it had materialized literally overnight. Hell, maybe it did.

The sushi place in question is Tatami Sushibar which, like Sushi Shop, is apparently an import from Montreal. Which I guess explains that "The Chaud" on my bill. "What Chaud," I thought. "I didn't order any Chauds."

What I did order was a Wonton Miso Soup, which was pretty good and gets extra points for the little chunks of shitake mushrooms floating in it. Also some Katsu Tofu, because it's been like 3 weeks since I last had deep-fried tofu.

Tatami's selection of maki and nigiri isn't super extensive, but they have enough interesting things to choose from. I got a Dragon Ball roll, with tempura shrimp and crab stick, as well as a smoked salmon filled Vancouver Roll served with a side of cream cheese mayo for dipping. Oh yeah, and some unagi nigiri. Am I too predictable?

Now I've seen quite a bit of sushi over the past 9 months or so. Some of it has been crammed onto a big platter, some of it has been elegantly plated, but this... this has got to take the cake as the most over-the-top fancy presentation in all of Sushipalooza. Just look at that! All those little sticks holding up the sour cherries and whatnot were made out of fried noodles or something similar and technically edible. I picked them all out before it even occurred to me to use them to eat the sushi like popsicles. Now that would've been the classy thing to do!

And finally, we come to the semi-traditional sushi dessert of fried banana drizzled with honey. I think I might have preferred it drizzled with chocolate, but whatever, honey's good too.

So that's Tatami: King and Spadina style on a Yonge and Carlton budget! Or something like that. Hey, you can use that slogan guys, free of charge!

And yes, I know, I still haven't gone to Japango. I'll get to it...

Bonus: Etsu (1.8 km)

Hey everybody, long time no see! I know I half-promised to go to Japango at some point, and I tried to go tonight... but it turns out you can't just wander in there on a Saturday night without a reservation and expect to get a table. In all my 30-odd Sushipalooza outings, I never once needed a reservation. Of course I usually went on weeknights, and often to places with more tables and less of a reputation than Japango. Oh well, I guess I'll have to go some other time.

In the meantime, Japango's loss was Etsu's gain. Etsu is a relatively recent addition to Baldwin Village's already rather vast selection of Japanese restaurants. Departing Japango, we had to pass no fewer than 8 other sushi joints to get to Etsu, but all things considered I'm glad we did.

There were 3 people in our party, and we decided to keep things simple and order the "Dinner for 3", which was basically all the stuff you'd get in a standard bento box, multiplied by 3. But instead of crummy "green salad", it comes with wakame seaweed salad, so we're off to a good start.

After the salad came some fairly standard miso soup and tempura vegetables and shrimp. After that was the sushi course, consisting of assorted nigiri and California rolls. They were pretty good California rolls.

The "main course" of teriyaki chicken came served on a sizzling iron platter. I'm a real sucker for anything served on a sizzling iron platter. Beats a plastic bento box any day.

OK, we didn't quite keep it simple; in addition to our set-course dinner we got a fried tofu appetizer (because tofo just wants to be deep fried) and a Black Dragon roll, because otherwise I wouldn't have gotten any BBQ eel with my dinner.

After our dessert we had a pot of "Blooming Tea", a clear tea of aloe, honey, and rose buds served in a transparent glass pot. It was bloomin' fantastic. Very sweet, with a nice floral fragrance. A good way to settle your stomach after overstuffing it with sushi.

So yeah, we didn't get to go to Japango like we planned, but it all worked out pretty well in the end. The waitress (after mentioning they'd only been open 3 months) asked us to tell our friends if we liked the place. So, hey friends: we liked Etsu!

(p.s. - Be sure to check out the bathrooms!)

Post-Holiday Leftovers

Sushipalooza may have officially wrapped up at the end of 2009, but that doesn't mean I'm out of sushi places. Heck, if it was summer I might've kept it going to a 2km radius, but that's a little far to walk in this miserable winter weather.

Below are what would've (theoretically, maybe) been the next Sushipalooza visits, if only I had more gumption.

Sushi Shop - Bloor & Church (1.0 km)

Hey, when did this happen? I went to the Yonge and Carlton location of Sushi Shop some months ago, and I've been watching for their second location to open, but obviously I'm too lazy to check every week. It looks like Sushi Shop II should've made the final cut and pushed Aji Sai to the grand finale spot. Oops!

Japango (1.4 km)

I hear good things about this place, so I kind of regret cutting things off right before I got to it. Not to spoil the surprise, but I may end up checking it out as a "bonus" trip soon.

Aka Sushi (1.4 km)

Well, I guess I wouldn't have made it to Aka Sushi anyway... I believe they closed up shop sometime in October or November.

Sushi-Q - Eaton Centre (1.4 km)

The Sushi-Q location in Toronto Life Square may be MIA, but across the street in the Eaton Centre they're still going strong. In my university days I used to occasionally go here for their end-of-day half price specials (though these days it's like 20% off or something similarly lame).

Sushi & Bento (1.5 km)

Right up the street from Kyoto House, this is another one that I totally would've gone to if the year was just a few weeks longer.

Yuki Sushi (1.5 km)

No sooner had Aka Sushi curled up its toes and died when Yuki Sushi popped up a block away (in the former Wimpy's Diner location at Dundas and University) to take its place.

Yamato (1.5 km)

Wait, is a Japanese Steak House anything like a sushi restaurant? Maybe this place would've been disqualified... I hope not, because it was personally recommended by a friend of mine.

Sushi Inn (1.5 km)

It's in Yorkville, so I'm sure that means lots of big Hollywood stars have sent their errand boys in there to pick something up. Of course we already know that Patrick Stewart prefers Tokyo Sushi.

Shogun (1.5 km)

I've been here before... they're right across from the Cumberland theatre, and you can get sukiyaki cooked on a hot plate at your table. Or is it shabu-shabu?

Sushi Baldwin (1.6 km)

The dense knot of restaurants at the east end of Baldwin includes perhaps the highest per-storefront density of sushi places in town, starting with Sushi Baldwin.

Kuni Sushi Ya (1.7 km)

A little further along Baldwin, Kuni Sushi Ya offers what I'm sure is a lovely little patio when it's not minus effing sixteen outside.

Kon-Nichi-Wa (1.7 km)

This place was closed on the Saturday afternoon I walked by, but I'll give them the benefit of the doubt and assume that's not permanent. No menu posted outside, so I'm not sure if they're a "sushi" restaurant per se.

Etsu (1.8 km)

Man, going over this list is making me a little wistful for all the places I'll be missing out on. Maybe I'll check a few of them out anyway. Who's gonna stop me? You??

Fujiyama (1.8 km)

I think this is the only sushi restaurant on the Baldwin strip I have been to. I had a bowl of seafood tempura udon. The tempura was soggy, because it was floating in a bowl of soup. Duh.

Gallery Sushi (1.8 km)

If you can't find enough sushi restaurants on Baldwin, there's another mini-node around the corner at Dundas and McCaul, including Gallery Sushi in the Village by the Grange.

Just up the mall from Gallery Sushi are two Japanese-but-not-necessarily-sushi restaurants: Sakura in the food court, and diner-style Manpuku.

Sushi & BBQ (1.8 km)

Right across the street from Village by the Grange; I have no idea if this place is any relation to the Sushi & BBQ on Yonge St. Probably, though.

And that's as far out as I bothered to look. If you're counting (and I am), that's nearly 50 sushi restaurants within less than 2km of my house. Which is a lot of sushi! That was kind of the point of this whole enterprise, right? Wait, what was the point again?