Roku Nana is a newly opened sushi and Japanese food joint on Clinton Street. My wife and I came in here to try their sushi, and it was a pretty great deal for the price point.
We started with two rolls; the pink lady and the flamingo.
These were great. I liked the pink lady the best (pink colored roll), and my wife liked the flamingo.
Then, we did their 10-piece premium nigiri dinner, which was $53pp.
It comes with a hand roll as well. The uni was the best, followed by the fatty tuna.
There’s also a speakeasy upstairs serving awesome cocktails.
Sushi Hayashi is one of the “all you can eat” sushi/omakase spots that are trending now in the city. This spot is a pretty good deal. The pieces are all decent, and you get a solid amount of sushi for $98 in the omakase (14 courses). The salmon, shima aji and shrimp were our favorite pieces from the omakase. The wagyu fell short, and there was no uni, but over all this was a worth-while omakase.
Once you’re finished with the 14-course omakase, you get two rounds of “all you can eat” sushi ordering, which is limited to a selection of eel, scallop, lean tuna or fatty tuna. The toppings and garnishes are done away with during this time (just a brush of sauce, and some torching for the fatty tuna), and you’ll be charged $6 per piece for any nigiri that you order but don’t finish. The record is 72 pieces eaten. Insane.
I went with nine extra pieces total during this “all you can eat” portion of the meal; three each of the lean tuna, fatty tuna and scallop.
They really have the system down pat, and they operate like a well-oiled machine.
They’ve created the first fast food style omakase! Highly American! What follows below is a photo dump of all the courses.
Two appetizers:
Ten nigiri pieces:
The roll portion of the omakase:
Round 1 AYCE:
Round 2 AYCE:
Dessert: matcha ice cream.
SUSHI HAYASHI
355 E 50th Street
New York, NY 10022
This spot offers a great 18-course omakase for just $100. I’m just going to dump the photos I snapped for each piece, but our favorites were the following: oyster appetizer, shrimp, red snapper, shima aji, both medium and fatty tuna, uni, salmon, wagyu spoon, and the shrimp and uni hand roll we added at the end. We would definitely come back here again.
This new spot is located on 1st Street near 2nd Avenue. They offer a 14-course omakase for $88. We enjoyed the fatty tuna pieces, the shrimp, the king salmon appetizer, and especially the “New York” salmon piece (with tomato) and the tuna hand roll at the end.
I would definitely go back for seasonal menu changes and specials.
We did the 17-course omakase, which was $125. This was definitely worth the price of admission. Favorites included the oyster and salmon appetizers, as well as the otoro, uni and king crab pieces.
My wife and I came here with another foodie and social media influencer couple to try out some of this new restaurant’s menu. Aqua has both Italian and Japanese menus, so you can have a full-on omakase here, or you can dine a la carte and dig into some pasta or veal Milanese.
We selected eight items from this menu, and then had two versions of their tiramisu (one classic Italian, and one Japanese):
First off, they make some really nice cocktails, which is clutch since they have a gigantic bar (the whole space is pretty massive, actually).
We started with the mushroom and truffle arancini. These were delicious bites.
The lobster bisque pizzette was really unique. I’ve never had something like that. It makes for great table bread to share as a snack.
This red prawn carpaccio was absolutely incredible. This is a must order when you go here.
These little nuggets of fried rock shrimp were really tasty. They don’t look like much, but I was hooked. I could not stop popping them.
The oxtail and truffle mafalde was perfectly cooked and seasoned, and the oxtail was super tender and savory.
Here’s a shot of their 12-piece sashimi omakase, which has all of your favorites, salmon belly being my favorite.
This eight-piece roll had salmon and scallop, which was nice.
And finally, the yuzu shiso marinated lamb chops. These were awesome. After the red prawn carpaccio, this was probably my favorite item.
For dessert, we tried the classic tiramisu and the matcha/green team tiramisu. I think we all agreed that the classic version was better. I didn’t snap any photos of that, so you’ll just have to watch the video to see them!
This joint serves up a 15-course omakase for just $89! It’s really close by, so we had to give it a try.
My favorite items were the crab handroll, the stripekack, and the scallop with uni.
Great spot! No liquor license yet, and they don’t let you BYOB, but they said the license is in the works and they should have beer and wine soon.
I can’t wait to go back to try it again. The chef said the fish can change on a daily basis, and he likes to use a lot of unique and different fish than you normally see.
This review is for the Mishik Pulsd deal and not the premium omakase offered on their regular menu. So make sure to read below, too.
This Pulsd deal was pretty good, and I would say that Mishik is especially good if you are going for their premium omakase sets with better pieces. We still enjoyed the Pulsd deal, don’t get me wrong, but my wife and I enjoyed a few other spots more in that price range.
Mishik flies their product in from Japan and dry ages all of the fish used in their omakase. The aging process takes anywhere from one to three weeks depending on the fat quality and flavor of the fish. The chefs inspect everything upon arrival to determine how long it will be aged.
Their Pulsd flash deal is curated for the price point, but they also offer two different omakase dinners: one for $120 and one for $165, consisting of an appetizer, roughly 12-16 pieces of premium nigiri, a handroll, soup and dessert.
While we enjoyed the Pulsd deal, we probably would have enjoyed one of the other omakase meals more here. Premium!
That said, my favorite items were the king salmon, the donburi bowl, the hand roll with fried shiso and eel, the torched golden eye snapper, and, of course, the uni. They were very generous with the uni!
Go give this place a shot! I think you will enjoy it too.
This joint has a really nice 15-piece omakase for just $85. You get a lot of what would normally be “upgrade” toppings on the pieces, too. Things like uni, foie, etc. Here are some pics of everything we had (minus the hand roll).
My favorite was the wagyu beef with uni on top (obvious?). It was A5 rib eye!
I would definitely go back here again, and the joint is BYOB so that’s perfect! They also offer a super-upgraded 18-piece omakase for $140. But honestly, the 15-course is such a great value that I don’t think I’d get the 18-course.
Kinzan is an omakase joint in the west village that offers a $100 meal, and, currently, a 15% discount is you pay in cash.
While this doesn’t quite break the top five for low cost/high value omakase joints, there were definitely some highlights, like the albacore with chili garlic crisp…
Tuna with caviar…
And their Instagram claim to fame, the smoked martini course.
Definitely worth a shot! Great service and reasonable prices.
