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Latest Mr. Sushi location lives up to North Shore standards

It was a Friday night in May in Chicago. On the agenda later that evening was a visit to a legendary blues club in the Lincoln Park neighbourhood. But first was dinner with seven of my work colleagues, with only one other hailing from Vancouver.

It was a Friday night in May in Chicago.

On the agenda later that evening was a visit to a legendary blues club in the Lincoln Park neighbourhood. But first was dinner with seven of my work colleagues, with only one other hailing from Vancouver.

The restaurant, one of our Chicagoan peers told us, was named best in the city last year on some prestigious list and had been a red hot table ever since. The star of the menu was sushi.

Sushi in Illinois. You know, that midwest state on the giant lake 800 miles from the nearest ocean coast.

Dishes came out from the kitchen bearing various nigiri and maki, and one had some sashimi. These dishes were well prepared, elegant and fresh, but my Vancouver colleague and I exchanged a knowing look. This “best in show” sushi from Chicago would be middling fare in Vancouver, where such dishes appear every night in hundreds of restaurants with a much lower profile, not to mention price tag.

A month earlier in Las Vegas a similar thing happened when the hotel concierge recommended that my colleague and I try a trendy sushi joint just off The Strip. The fish in this Nevada desert sushi restaurant must surely have travelled as far as I to get to the table.

So here we are now, with another sushi review for The Dish. Groan, you say. How many is this now, Chris? 10?

What a nuisance, all these sushi joints with their hyper-local, extra fresh fish in staggering variety. Sigh.

More tales of melt-in-your-mouth tuna from Kyuquot Sound, buttery scallops plucked from Qualicum, meaty prawns from the Jervis Inlet? Yes, I’m afraid so. Such is the burden of life on the North Shore.

My latest visit was to a sushi emporium in Lower Lonsdale, a neighbourhood that has given rise to many columns this year in the wake of the relentless proliferation of new restaurants servicing the city’s growing population and influx of hungry visitors.

New to the scene is the second location of Mr. Sushi, a group that began with much humbler digs in Lynn Valley, but now includes a modern and bustling space on West First and Lonsdale Avenue that not only didn’t have an available table at the time of my visit, but also quoted 35 minutes to fill my takeout order.

This is not a complaint, I assure you. I have made my feelings well known about supporting independent venues, and anyway the wait for my order afforded me the time to pop down to Green Leaf Brewing at the Quay to pick up a couple of bombers of IPA to pair with my meal, an assortment of nigiri, maki, and sashimi to share with my in-laws visiting from Northern England where, they report, one is much more likely to find sushi in prepacked trays at the local Tesco than on the menu of the nearest seafood restaurant.

Mine was a three-bag takeout order that I think must have pushed the kitchen to the brink as it contended with a full house, a wait list, and many other to-go patrons.

Whiling away the final moments of my wait back in the restaurant I watched a server deliver a flaming roll of some kind to a solo diner who barely looked up from his mobile phone when the dish was presented. When he eventually condescended to acknowledge that something had been put in front of him, he summoned the server back to ask what he ought to do with the dish.

Dear Reader: the multiplicity of responses that leapt to my mind at that moment cannot be shared in these pages, but the scene did make me consider my stance on maki that has been set aflame.

I’m of the mind that if you try it once, you needn’t ever order it again. Aburi sushi, which is nigiri that has been tightly pressed and lightly torched, bringing out the flavoursome oils of the fish and adding a layer of complexity, is a great innovation.

Mr. Sushi does a nice job of aburi, including a delicious version with salmon, house-signature oshi sauce and jalapenos. A booze-soaked roll burning blue tableside, however, feels more like pyrotechnic fussiness than fastidious preparation and, in my experience, fire is anathema to the spirit of sushi.

Deliberately sidestepping exotic ingredients and techniques, I suppose my order must have seemed decidedly beige, drawing on mostly traditional preparations, but it did still reveal a number of very good items.

From the Assorted Sashimi, the salmon belly was lush and round, melting on the tongue. Deep vermillion-coloured tuna sashimi was similarly indulgent, while generous morsels of unagi (barbecued eel) nigiri were very fresh and perfectly cooked with just a hint of requisite smoky-sweet glaze.

A B.C. Roll that included crispy salmon skin reinforced my appreciation for our local catch, while a Gomae Roll, densely filled with wilted spinach in salty-sweet sesame dressing, was a very satisfying vegetarian option. A chopped scallop roll, once again showcasing the very generous portioning supplied by Mr. Sushi, was good value at $5.50.

Other items in my order included faithful iterations of a Dynamite Roll (prawn tempura, crab, avocado and cucumber), yam tempura roll, veggie roll, and prawn, salmon, mackerel and yellow tail nigiri.

The meal worked out to be about $20 per person.

Mr. Sushi is located at 107 Lonsdale Ave. mrsushivancouver.com 604-770-4202

Chris Dagenais served as a manager for several restaurants downtown and on the North Shore. A self-described wine fanatic, he earned his sommelier diploma in 2001. He can be reached via email at hungryontheshore@gmail.com. North Shore News dining reviews are conducted anonymously and all meals are paid for by the newspaper.