Shinka Sushi Bar
150 Laurier Ave. W., 613-565-8998, shinkasushibar.com
Prices:
sushi rolls $7.50 to $20, specialties $18 to $26, poke bowls $15.50 to $21.50
Open
: Monday to Thursday noon to 2 p.m. and 4 to 8 p.m., Friday to Sunday noon to 2 p.m. and 4 to 8:30 p.m.
I shed a prejudice this month thanks to Shinka Sushi Bar.
Packaged sushi bought from grocery stores just never did it for me. How could it, given some sublime raw-fish experiences I’ve had at exceptional Japanese restaurants outside Ottawa where the bar was set very high? Because of the discrepancy between those lows and highs, I generalized that, if sushi was to be the focus of a meal, it should be enjoyed in a dining room or, better yet, at a bar, dispensed by an amiable expert chef.
Of course, that now seems like pre-pandemic thinking. Mired in yet another lockdown that has made Ottawa’s restaurant dining rooms off-limits, we have to take our sushi however we can get it. Fortunately, the ambitious-beyond-the-norm items I’ve had in the last week from Shinka Sushi Bar were, for the most part, deftly made and delightfully tasty. They traveled well enough to persuade me that take-home sushi can be a very good thing.
I had high expectations from Shinka, as a few years ago I had had an impressive off-duty lunch at its precursor at the same downtown address, New Generation Sushi. This week, I confirmed that Shinka, which opened in 2017, was more or less New Generation rebranded by its veteran chef-owner, John Diep.
Diep told me that New Generation changed names because similarly named sushi places in Toronto were all-you-can-eat sushi places and Shinka, with its higher-end, more creative mandate, wanted to avoid any confusion.
Shinka’s menu also heightened our anticipation. The choices here are notches higher than what an all-you-can-sushi place might offer, promising upscale pleasures with prices to match. Think unagi nigiri topped with morsels of pan-seared foie gras, preparations with Hokkaido scallops from Northern Japan, which are renowned for their sweetness, and belly cuts of tuna and salmon, including the prized, supremely fatty o-toro bluefin sashimi.
The menu is not just discerning. It’s also broad. Shinka serves 13 kinds of poke bowls, placing raw fish or chicken or lobster or snow crab atop rice for those who think sushi rolls are insubstantial and main courses should come in bowls. If raw fish isn’t for you, grilled chicken and grilled salmon are available. If you don’t eat fish and other animals, there’s an extensive vegan sushi menu featuring items where mushrooms, sweet potato, tofu and the like add heft.
Online ordering was a snap. When I arrived at the appointed time to pick up my food (rather than relying on one of the delivery services whose commissions eat into restaurant revenues), I saw that the formerly sleek lounge had been optimized for takeout, with a wall of branded boxes replacing seating and obscuring the sushi bar.
The box that I took home for my first dinner was filled with an array of eye-catching, à la carte goodies that put pristinely fresh fish front and centre. Beautifully arranged and ever better tasting were slabs of medium-fatty chu-toro bluefin sashimi and lozenges of salmon belly and amberjack on rice, both morsels of fish torched to add extra texture and flavour before being precisely garnished. Other recherché and alluring choices included Japanese grunt fish topped with jalapeno, striped jack topped with sturgeon caviar and gold flake and golden threadfin topped with sea urchin.
Some of these imported-from-Japan fish choices were unknown to me, and I have no past yardsticks, or at least recent memories, against which to measure them. All I can say is that we felt spoiled by these sophisticated and clearly well-crafted items.
Among Shinka’s specialties were several sauced raw-fish dishes that some would call globally inspired sushi innovations. “Carpaccio” from Shinka consisted of thinly sliced salmon or tuna sitting in a homemade soy-citrus sauce and topped with green onion, cilantro, tobiko and fried garlic. The same sauce and garnishes came with Shinka’s “new-style sashimi combo” of salmon, sea bass and red tuna. Diep told me these items were very popular, and I could see why their set of winning flavours would be reinforced. If I could suggest one alternative, it might be pairing a bit of sharp chili heat might work with some of the raw-fish specialties.
We really savoured two preparations that highlighted raw Hokkaido scallops. The seafood shone in a simple, well-sauced crudo preparation and mounded with avocado on the crunchy base of a tempura-fried shiso leaf.
Sucker for duck liver that I am, I had to order the unagi topped with pan-seared foie gras. It did feel like a decadent splurge, even if the foie was a little overcooked and the sumptuous roasted freshwater eel overshadowed it.
I sampled some of Shinka’s signature rolls — the Osaka, made with red tuna, salmon, crabstick, avocado and the Butterfly, whose salmon had either been tempura-fried or smoked — and both were worth their premium prices.
Of the deep-fried appetizers that we tried, I thought best of Shinka’s crisp calamari morsels, while the good chicken gyozas and agedashi tofu seemed less like must-orders.
During the pandemic, we all live and learn. My latest lesson, courtesy of Diep and Shinka Sushi Bar, is that I should order in well-made, distinctive sushi more often.