SUSHI O SAKE

Knowing little about Japanese food (except that Wegman’s sushi take-out is close to the cashier, and a good, quick dinner), we brought along Nanci Trapani, who has spent time in Japan and knows lots more about the food and customs than we. She, of a librarianish persuasion, researched and printed for us a guide to Japanese foods that included basashi (horse sashimi), which had us wondering why we’d taken this assignment. Blessings multiply. We did not find basashi anywhere on the menu, and Sushi O Sake’s veteran head waiter, Sean, quickly set our qualms aside, suggesting we share a bottle of chilled sake and several selections of sushi before ordering our main courses.

Delicate, tender slices of octopus, smoked eel, and a sweet, omelette-y egg custard arrived, elegantly draped over ovals of vinegared sushi rice, the custard secured with a girdle of nori, a paper-thin seaweed. The Japanese vegetable roll -- nori and rice wrapped around avocado, pickled radish, cucumber, squash, and pickled burdock -- combined the sweet creaminess of ripe avocado with the crunch of burdock and the sweetness and acidity of the pickled vegetables. An order of the futomaki roll combined many of the Japanese roll’s contents with egg, crabmeat, and shiitake mushroom. A dip in soy sauce spiked with hot wasabi, and extraordinarily crisp pickled ginger added zing to it all.

Does the prospect of eating with chopsticks send you into an ohgoddon’tletmelooklikeajerk panic? Fear not – it’s perfectly acceptable to eat these with your fingers. For our first main course, we ordered shrimp and vegetable tempura, which was everything tempura should be – light, fresh, and nongreasy – and how do they get those shrimps to stand up so straight? A beef teriyaki bento box brought a tasting-menu selection including tempura, California roll, gyoza (fried pork dumplings), shumai (steamed shrimp dumplings), and chicken tatsuta age (small pieces of fried chicken), with two very different kinds of seaweed salad. Both entrees were served with delicate miso soup, soy in another of its amazing variations. Our third main was a pair of special rolls, the “Fashion,” a roll of crabmeat, avocado, and cucumber draped with creamy raw tuna, and the “Mermaid,” another study in textures: crunchy shrimp tempura and fresh asparagus, which protruded as the mermaid’s tailfins, and unctuous smoked eel, and an exquisitely laid-out wrapping of mosaic-ed strips of avocado. Among the most popular rolls, we were told, is the “007” – spicy tuna and avocado, the entirety deep-fried and served with two sauces and smelt roe.

We are eager to try some of the other special rolls, many of them tuned to the Western palate, with names like Scooby Doo, American Dream, Philadelphia (it’s made with cream cheese and smoked salmon), and Out of Control. But there are so many unusual and delicious-sounding offerings on the menu, from appetizers and salads to dessert (do try the tempura-ed green-tea ice cream with chocolate sauce), as well as a tempting lunch menu, that we look forward to exploring it in future visits.

Well lighted by a sparkling of intense little red-glass hanging lamps, Sushi O Sake is a lively place on a weekend night, with friendly service, and while the weather holds, plenty of seating outside as well as in. Inside, there’s always a show at the sushi bar, where two deft chefs ply their craft with enviable concentration, their focus and artistry demonstrated in platter after exquisite platter. The restaurant carries a small but good selection of beer and wine (including two Finger Lakes Rieslings, which would pair well with the delicate flavors of Japanese food), but the restaurant’s beverage focus is on a broad selection of chilled sakes, rated from sweet to dry. We tried a middle-of-the-road selection, found it refreshing, and hope to become better acquainted with chilled sakes. To refresh our memories, we also tried a warm sake, and it was as medicinal and yucky as we remember warm sake being. An offshoot of Collegetown’s popular Plum Tree restaurant, Sushi O Sake is located at 107 North Aurora Street. They don’t take reservations, but you can call 272-1200 for information.