[Tokyo] Sushi Sho Masa すし匠 まさ

Rating: ❤❤❤❤

After our impressive meal at Sushi Sho earlier this year, we decided to try Sushi Sho Masa next which is opened by one of Chef Keiji Nakazawa's apprentices Chef Masakatsu Oka. Initially we tried to use Visa Signature Concierge to make a reservation but we were told to book through a hotel instead since they don't take bookings through Visa. Once we made it into the restaurant, the service turned out to be really friendly and they have staff that can speak English and Mandarin. We ended up having close to 50 pieces of otsumami (appetizers) and sushi for our dinner, and we were so stuffed we couldn't eat lunch the next day! Price was steep though at ¥‎30,000 per person and I guess if you average out the cost by the number of pieces that we had, it may be worth it but personally I would rather the course be pared down to a more concise version. I guess we could have told him to stop at any time but since it was our first time there, we didn't want to miss out on anything. Most of the pieces were good and some were outstanding especially the classic fishes like the kohada, aji and iwashi. The chef also alternated between tsumami and sushi like Sushi Sho but he had more of a logic to it in which we would first eat a raw version of a fish that would then be followed by a cooked version so we can taste the difference between the two. Overall, I enjoyed my meal at Sushi Sho Masa and though I would still prefer the original Sushi Sho, Masa is more foreigner-friendly and a great place to get a taste of Edomae-style sushi. 

Even for palate cleansers, we had quite a bit of variety throughout the meal including wakame, umibudo (sea grapes), gari (ginger), baby melon, and pickles. 

Tako (octopus)

Magokarei (marbled flounder) with liver

Amaebi (sweet shrimp)

Conch Shell

Aged Saba

Shirako (milt) of octopus

Sumi-Ika (baby squid)

Bottom part of baby squid

Sawara (Spanish mackerel)

Grilled sawara

Ankimo (monkfish liver)

Sanma (Pacific saury) - one of our favorite pieces here.

Grilled sanma

Kohada (gizzard shad) is a fish that is most often used to gauge the skill of a sushi chef and it was definitely outstanding here. 

Conch shell with liver

Shrimp innards

Shio-Ika (salted squid)

Grilled shio-ika

Hotaru Ika is no longer in season but these had been preserved in salt.

Shinko (baby kohada)

Grilled Maguro cheek with wasabi

Yellowtail

Yellowtail with wasabi

Aji with miso and green onion

Bonito with karashi mustard

Buri (amberjack)

Bonito with garlic pieces that had been soaked in shoyu (soy sauce) for over a month

Grilled Magokarei

Kodai with wasabi and ume

Chutoro

Otoro with layers of fatty tuna and wasabi - a total of 4 layers of wasabi had been inserted between the rice and the 3 piece of toro. What an interesting way to present toro and another one of our favorite pieces!

Akami-zuke

Abalone

Cooked abalone

Anago (conger eel)

Nodoguro (blackthroat seaperch)

Kuruma Ebi (tiger prawn)

Murasaki uni from Rishiri in Hokkaido - the uni pieces were the only ones Masa-san served on his hand. It's too bad that the supply had been impacted by the typhoon recently and the quality was not as good as it can be. 

Ikura (salmon roe) - it's ikura season now and this was really delicious!

Grilled amaebi shrimp head

Kinmedai (golden eye sea bream)

Anago with sudachi & salt and sweet sauce

Tuna maki roll

King salmon - very rarely do you get served salmon as sushi in Tokyo because it is a problematic fish with a high amount of parasites in its raw flesh and most high-end sushi-yas do not like serve frozen fish. This salmon was different though - we were told this is similar to Tokishirazu Konbujime or roughly translated as "salmon that does not know time" where every year around Spring, a small number of salmon from Russia would somehow get lost and end up in Japan. The first time we had salmon as sushi in Tokyo was also at Sushi Sho. 

Kinmedai skin

Kinmedai belly

Iwashi (sardine) - this was the prettiest iwashi I've ever seen and J kept saying that the flesh marbling looks almost like Iberico ham. 

Grilled uni

Tamago (egg)

Sushi Sho Masa すし匠 まさ

4-1-15 Nishiazabu Minato Tokyo 

東京都 港区 西麻布 4-1-15 セブン西麻布 Ｂ１Ｆ

Tel: +81-3-3499-9178

http://tabelog.com/en/tokyo/A1307/A130703/13016512/




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