Sushi Saito Azabudai (鮨さいとう 麻布台)
⭐⭐⭐
🍣 Sushi / 📍 Kamiyacho
📓 Visits: 1
The best nigiri in the set was probably the kasugo with an Azabudai store original topping of bainiku. The kohada, uni and anago were identical to what you'd find in the main store: the uni was one of the brands that Saito-san uses; the anago was large, unctuous, flavourful and the yuzu added balance to the not overbearing nitsume. The hotate was also outstanding. Less good was the opening piece of amadai which was a little chewy (Saito-san uses karei). Compared with the main store the chutoro was just OK. Compared with other sushi restaurants at this price it was good. The akami zuke was much better, but still some way off what Saito-san would serve. The final piece of sushi was a disaster: a poor quality torutaku that was sodden in nikiri. The dashi in the miso soup was much weaker compared with the main store. The rice was inconsistent. First a bit dry, then softer as the meal went on (as if it was from a different batch) and occasionally too warm. The acidity was the same as the main store. The neta were sliced much more roughly than at the main store. Instead of tamago-yaki a sweet, warm, steamed egg custard pudding to finish. Saito-san's pudding-style tamago-yaki is one of the best in any sushi restaurant but this smashed that out of the park. Eleven out of ten.
Disappointingly, you can't order extra sushi at the end of the course. I think there are two main reasons for this (1) time (two rotations at lunch is pretty much unheard of) and (2) the fish is prepped at the main store, so there's a limited amount of material on site. As a customer, none of this is my problem though and unless you're a small eater 11-12 small pieces is not really enough. The course took 90 minutes. That's a little long for that amount of sushi but with only one chef making the nigiri and ten diners to serve (Saito-san only serves 8) all eating exactly the same thing at the same time it's never going to be somewhere you can get out of in under an hour.
Takimoto-san introduced every piece of sushi to every diner, in Japanese or English as appropriate, but made no attempt at conversation. If I had to say "kohada desu" 20 times in the space of a few hours I'd get bored of the sound of my own voice. I suppose it's better than the chef not bothering to introduce the sushi at all but this was literally sushi by numbers. There was a mix of experienced and inexperienced diners on my visit. The chef allowed customers to book again after their meal and most people, on my visit, did so.
The name means there will never be shortage of demand for seats here and I suspect that was why those diners booked again. But if you were hoping this was going to be a carbon copy of Sushi Saito, without the difficulty in getting a seat, you're going to be disappointed. If you're easily pleased or you're desperate to try Saito-style sushi or you want to go somewhere relaxed, where you can book online, where you don't need any Japanese and/or you're on a budget then you may well be very happy eating here. But you can get all of that at Tsubomi but with much better service, and even though prices went up from 1st April 2024 it's actually still cheaper.
You could say this about many or most of the restaurants in Azabudai Hills but perhaps Sushi Saito Azabudai is the poster child: a restaurant/format that has been designed to fit within limited logistics and expensive rents, rather than for the experience of the customer or the ambitions of the chef.
📌 https://tabelog.com/tokyo/A1307/A130701/13295096/
❓ My Rating: ⭐⭐⭐ 3.8
📱 Booking: 🟧 Omakase only. When slots are released with notice they fill up quickly but they've been releasing extra seats without notice, so keep checking.
📍 Location:
Azabudai Hills Market. Discretely located to the right of Yamayuki. A few minutes from Kamiyacho Station Exit 5.
📶 Free WiFi? ✅ Yes
📅 Visit April 2024
🕛 Lunch
🐟 Tai-noko
🍣 Amadai
🍣 Kinmedai
🍣 Kohada
🍣 Kasugo bainiku topping
🍣 Akami zuke
🍣 Chutoro
🍣 Hotate
🍣 Sumi ika
🍣 Kuruma ebi
🍚 Uni mini donburi
🍣 Anago
🍲 Miso soup
🍙 Torutaku ½
🥚 Egg custard
💴 Damage: 16,500 inc. tea and water
⏱️ Time taken: 1h30m
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