Shimbashi Shimizu

Shimbashi Shimizu (新ばし しみづ)

⭐⭐⭐

🍣 Sushi / 📍 Shimbashi

📓 Visits: 1

Shimbashi Shimizu is an old school sushi restaurant that's been open for over 23 years.  There's a great write-up on the restaurant on Tokyo Table Trip which will make any hardcore sushi lover want to visit.  It had been on my list for some time but as bookings are not hard it was always near the back of my queue.  At lunch you can choose between omakase nigiri, omakase with tsumami or okonomi.  I chose the former.

Hirame was a bit chewy as you might expect from an old-school place and sumi ika was a bit hard, as it can be at times.  Akami and chutoro were very good.  The kohada was a bit woolly in texture.  Shime saba was very good.  Kuruma ebi was large but lacking in flavour.  Uni was huge, at least 50% bigger than a standard gunkan-maki.  Unfortunately the uni was not very good quality.  The final piece of fish was the anago which was excellent, though seasoned with nitsume which is not my preference.  The meal finished with a particularly good owan with hamaguri dashi, hamaguri kaibabshira, mozoku and seri and then tamago and a strawberry.  Rice was sour and soft.  The neta were large.

Shimizu-san chatted a little with a regular but there was no conversation with anyone else.  Not every item of sushi was named.  Despite that Shimizu-san was polite, generally smiled and there were no awkward moments in service.  There's no back kitchen so you can see all the preparation of cooked items, which is unusual for a sushi restaurant.  On the other hand, chef's counter is sunken so you can't see his knife.  Seating is backless, but for nigiri lunch you won't be there very long.  Although you will find some older pictures of the sushi on Tabelog and elsewhere it seems that since last year he's introduced a photo ban.

The bill was exactly JPY 15,000 which is quite a lot for 12 nigiri, tamago and no makimono and about 3-5K more than I'd be happy to pay for sushi of this quality or about 3 pieces fewer than I'd expect at this price.  Although the neta were large, might be more expensive to buy and a little higher in quality than other lunches under 15K, it's not enough for a full meal, there's much better value for lunch elsewhere and pricing is close to the best value full course dinners.  The course was apparently JPY 13,000 in 2022 so some of this is due to inflation.  For omakase with tsumami you should budget around 26K.

You must be able to speak Japanese to reserve Shimizu or be accompanied by someone who can, though the only time I had to speak was to confirm the course I wanted, choose a drink and ask for the bill.  Shimizu-san has three young assistants so I'm sure he could accommodate non-Japanese speakers if he wanted to, but that's the point: he just doesn't.

There's perhaps nowhere else where you can eat sushi of this quality for under 20K that's so easy to reserve but that's the only standout for me at Shimbashi Shimizu.

📌 https://tabelog.com/tokyo/A1301/A130103/13002892/

❓ My Rating: ⭐⭐⭐ 3.9 (value: 3.5)

📱 Booking: 🟩 Up to a week in advance by phone from 8am.  No English spoken.  Proxy reservations are not accepted.

📍 Location: 

2-15-10 Shimbashi.  Down an alley in the middle of block 15 of Shimbashi 2-chome.  From Karasumori dori, opposite Astil Shimbashi, head up the alley between the 7 Bank ATM and Family Mart and take the first left after passing under the wooden tori.  Restaurant is on the left.  If you find yourself in front of the stone tori in front of Karasumori Shrine then turn around and take the 2nd right.  2 mins from JR Shimbashi station Karasumori exit.
Map data ©2023 Google

📶 Free WiFi? ❌ No

📅 Visit February 2023

Hirame
Sumi ika
Akami
Toro
Kohada
Akagai
Kasugo
Hamaguri
Shime saba
Kuruma ebi
Uni gunkanmaki
Anago
Owan
Tamago
Ichigo

💴 Damage: 15,000

⏱️ Time taken: 55m