Sushi Iwao

⚠️ The 3k lunch stopped at the end of March 2023.

Sushi Iwao (すし いわお)

⭐⭐⭐

🍣 Sushi / 📍 Akasaka

📓 Visits: 3

What's the best sushi you can get for 10K, or 6K or even 3K?  There are plenty of places offering low-price sushi but how do you find the quality among the mediocre and poor?  One way is to look at the difference in price between the lunch course and the dinner course.  Those restaurants with the biggest difference are very likely offering fantastic sushi at lunch at cut price.  And that brings us to Sushi Iwao.  The restaurant opened in April 2022 with omakase at dinner priced at 22K and at lunch only chirashi zushi offered at JPY 6,000.  Apparently that was failing to bring in the punters so from November the same year the chirashi was reduced in price to JPY 4,800 and two nigiri-only lunches priced at JPY 3,300 for 10 and JPY 5,500 for 12 were introduced.  On all my visits I went for the 3k lunch.

First thing to say is this is proper omakase sushi: there's no menu and your nigiri are delivered one-by-one by the chef in front of you at the counter.  Chef Takashi Okabe (the "Iwao" is the usual reading of the kanji for his first name) uses two kinds of rice, both seasoned with red vinegar: strongly for tuna and fatty fish and less strongly for other fish.  Rice is very firm.

It's not without fault.  The preparation of the ika is not the best - a bit hard on visit #1 and not properly skinned on visit #2.  The rice was too warm a couple of times on visits #2 and #3.  Okabe-san ages much of his fish and seasonings are very strong.  The hamaguri ichi-ban dashi served at the start of the course is too salty, as is the kanpyo at the end.  Ikura was salty and strongly seasoned and I felt the amai ebi kobujime was over-cured.  Needless to say, if you don't like strongly-flavoured sushi you may not enjoy Iwao.  If you were paying 22k for dinner you might hope for slightly better quality neta.  But for 3k?  This is easily the best sushi I've had at this price and I've had poorer sushi for more.

If you ask for water you'll be given a small bottle of Fuji water and charged 690 yen for it, which isn't much in the grand scheme of things at dinner but when water is 20% of the cost of your lunch it feels like a lot, so stick to tea.  You can place additional orders at the end of the course but I was charged JPY 1,100 for one additional nigiri on my first visit.  Again, at dinner this is reasonable but it's effectively 3 times the price of a course item at lunch so feels expensive.

Okabe-san is quite friendly and upbeat.  He worked for seven years at Inagiku, previously associated with the Four Seasons Hotel Hong Kong, but since 2018 is now Shikigiku coinciding with the same year Sushi Saito opened.  Before going independent he spent the last three years working at the Hilton Tokyo and Sushi Iwa.  Alas he's forgotten all his English but an influx of English-speaking guests can easily fix that :)

You should budget an hour for the lunch course.  Things might be quicker if there are fewer guests or if tell the chef you have limited time.

The neta are fairly large and the nigiri medium sized.  Ten nigiri is not enough for a full lunch so either go not very hungry or have a second lunch.

A couple of years ago I might have rated this 4+ mainly on value but I've got more picky recently so anywhere with still notable faults I'm rating under 4.  But for value this is definitely 5.0.  It's such a bargain it almost feels like theft.

📌 https://tabelog.com/tokyo/A1308/A130801/13269557/

❓ My Rating: ⭐⭐⭐ 3.9 (value: 5.0)

📱 Booking: 🟩 Easy.  For lunch via TableCheck at least one working day in advance (credit card required).  Via Tabelog a day in advance.  Same day bookings by phone may be possible.  There are nominally two starts at lunch: 11:30 and 13:00 but it's not busy right now so you should be able to negotiate a different time if you need to.

📍 Location: 

Jodo-ji, 4-3-5 Akasaka.  From Hitosugi Dori enter Jodo-ji (temple) opposite 7-Eleven.  Restaurant is 50m on the right.  3 mins from nearby stations.
Map data ©2023 Google

📅 Visit March 2023

Lunch 10 nigiri + makimono:
Hamaguri dashi
Amadai kobujime
Yari ika
Sawara
Kasugo
Tairagai
Akami zuke
Toru taku?
Amai ebi
Ikura
Anago
Owan
Kanpyo
(No tamago)

💴 Damage: 3,300 incl. tea
⏱️ Time taken: 30m

📅 Visit February 2023

Lunch 10 nigiri + makimono:
Hamaguri ichiban dashi
Kohada
Hirame kobujime
Yari ika
Tairagai
Akami
Toru taku
Shime saba
Amai ebi kobujime
Ikura
Anago
Owan
Kanpyo
Tamago pudding

💴 Damage: 3,960 (3300 + water @ 660)
⏱️ Time taken: 50m

📅 Visit January 2023

Lunch 10 nigiri + makimono:
Hamaguri ichiban dashi
Kohada
Suzuki
Sumi ika
Kasugo
Taigarai
Akami zuke
Torutaku
Shime saba
Amai ebi kobujime
Anago
Miso soup
Kanpyo
+Buri 1,100
Tamago pudding

💴 Damage: 4,400
⏱️ Time taken: 35m