MEOW: Chirashizushi, Inaka Seafood Gourmet, Arcadia

Imagine the horror when after 9 months of not eating raw fish in order to properly incubate a baby, I found out that one of my favorite sushi joints, the girl-powered Azami Sushi Cafe on Melrose, had closed.

But also imagine the joy when I read that Azami's co-owner and female sushi chef extraordinaire Niki Nakayama had opened Inaka Seafood Gourmet in Arcadia, just a stone's throw away from me!

Before you put your best sushi-eating outfit on for Azami the Sequel though, hold up. Inaka is not a sushi restaurant but rather, a Japanese deli that serves up health-conscious Japanese rice and noodle dishes by day and does a special Chef's Table by night. Don't be disappointed though. Just try the chirashizushi at Inaka and you'll experience the fresh seafood and simple, tasty presentations that Chef Niki was known for at the late Azami.

Hungry after a recent morning of throwing my money away at Arcadia's Santa Anita Mall, I skipped the food court and drove across the street to Inaka to chow on some chirashi, my latest MEOW (MEal Of the Week).

I'm a sucker for chirashi first of all because it's so darn pretty with slices of sashimi and other accoutrements laid atop a bed of sushi rice like a colorful quilt. Inaka's version is a clear winner, not only because it too is nice to look at, but also because it has a nice balance of flavors and textures. Fresh-to-the-max buttery soft slices of sashimi such as salmon, maguro, and albacore are accompanied by the coarser textures of crab and spicy tuna. Their sushi rice is just slightly warm, and is neither too sweet nor too vinegary. A dash of sesame seeds and some pickled ginger help to round the whole thing out.

Oh yeah, and this whole thing costs just $11.50 before tax and tip which is a helluva deal considering $5.25 buys you a 6-piece Chicken McNugget and large fries across the street at the mall. You do the math.

Inaka Seafood Gourmet
838 S. Baldwin Ave.
Arcadia, CA 91007
(626) 254-9926
www.inakagourmet.com

P.S. Chef Niki also does an eight course Chef's Table at night for $80 per person which I am dying to try after reading LA & OC Foodie's review. Tables fill up quickly so please book a week or two in advance!

Rock Star Lunch Tour, Day Four: I Am So Money, Kiriko Sushi, West LA

So the ten dollar Sapp Coffee Shop Thai boat noodles and Scoops ice cream lunch was really good and all, but who am I kidding?

Rock stars spend money.

That's just what we do. It's in our blood. I don't care if I'm spending the whole advance on my album sales, I gotta have a cool crib, fly threads, a nice ride--wait, i mean nice rides (plural), and expensive lunches. My Money Manager loooved when I went to Sapp & Scoops the other day and had lunch and dessert for cheap. But when I went to Kiriko Sushi on Day Four of my Rock Star Lunch Tour??? Not so much.

This time instead of dining solo, I lunched with my girlfriend C who, being a rock star herself, loves to buy lots of things too. And that's probably the reason why after settling in at this tiny Sawtelle sushi bar, we decided not to go with some of the more moderate lunch choices like the sashimi, nigiri sushi or hand roll lunch combinations which hover around the $20 range and went straight for the bling: a $36 omakase lunch.

Now most normal working folk would certainly gawk at a thirty-six dollar lunch (more like forty-five after you add in tax and tip, and even more if you get drinks) since that's pretty much lunch for an entire week spent in one day. But c'mon, when you have money to spend like all us rock stars, big time producers, B-movie actors, actor-model-waiters and trophy wives, thirty six bucks for an omakase lunch coming from a quality restaurant is nothing! A mere drop in the bucket for ten pieces of melt-in-your-mouth sushi which on this particular day included bluefin tuna, toro, Japanese yellowtail, Japanese red snapper, Spanish mackerel, sea scallop, house-smoked salmon with caviar, sea eel and a blue crab handroll, all extremely fresh and of excellent quality. Heck, even if you're not a C-list celebrity or above, it's still worth getting considering the same type of meal would probably be at least twice as much at dinner time.


After getting ripped a new one by my Money Manager for living such an extravagant lifestyle when my debut album hasn't even dropped yet, I told him not to worry 'cause I'm the shizz. I'll sell so many records I'll be able to afford lunch and dinner at Kiriko every day.

Kiriko Sushi
11301 Olympic Blvd. #102
Los Angeles, CA 90064
(310) 478-7769
www.kirikosushi.com