Sushi Yukinari

⚠️ Moved to Aoyama as of June 2024.

Sushi Yukinari (鮨 ゆきなり)

⭐⭐⭐⭐

🍣 Sushi / 📍 Shibuya

📓 Visits: 1 (2023)

"Basement, Grim Building, Shibuya" is not the most auspicious address on paper but Sushi Yukinari has the most potential of any new sushi restaurant I've visited recently.  Omakase at dinner is JPY 22,000 while a shorter omakase lunch is JPY 13,000.  Chef recently introduced a nigiri-only lunch priced at JPY 8,000.  On my visit I had omakase lunch.

The meal included a few non-sushi items: a suppon chawanmushi which was everything you ever hope you'd get from a suppon chawanmushi: packed with meat and not simply flavoured with dashi; a satoimo manju and a matcha blancmange to finish.  I rated these 10/10.  The owan made from hamaguri dashi was a little salty for me.  Other cooked items included a perfect kuruma ebi, dispatched to order and served rare and an excellent unagi temaki.

It might seem disparaging to spend so much time talking about cooked items but not a month goes by now when a new sushi restaurant in Tokyo pops up serving good nigiri and the non-nigiri items are where a young chef has maximum opportunity to differentiate himself.  It's true though that if the nigiri are no good then nothing else matters and here they are mostly very good.  Tuna was from a 133kg fish from Oma, supplied by Yamayuki, natch, though only one piece of tuna was included in the set.  The kohada was sensational.  The uni was good with just a faint taste of alum.  On the other hand the katuso, kasugo and aji were not so good.  The nigiri are quite small.

Baba Yukinari has a waitress to attend to drinks but he needs to employ a kitchen assistant.  He frequently disappears to prepare those magic cooked items so the meal runs a little slow.  On my visit there were just one other party of two and the meal was probably perfectly paced for them but it was a little slow for me.  With more diners I'd expect the meal to take even longer.

Sushi Yukinari occupies the space which was previously the private room at Sushi Haijme where Yukinari-san previously worked.  Prior to that he was general at Gotanda Sushi Tokyo 81 and trained at Ginza Onodera.  Say what you like about the sushi at Onodera but it's a solid place to learn from and with over two years at 81 this isn't his first time running a sushi counter.  Yukinari-san smiles and chats enthusiastically the whole time.  Despite being the only person behind the counter he followed me out through the other restaurant and up the stairs to see me off.

If you're more patient than I am I'd highly recommend a visit to Sushi Yukinari.  It's easy to book, excellent value and very central.

📌 https://tabelog.com/tokyo/A1303/A130301/13283047/ 

❓ My Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐ 4.1

📱 Booking: 🟩 Easy.  Next day via Tabelog or same-day by phone.  Same-day lunch reservations by phone are possible.

📍 Location: 

B1F Grim Bldg, 3-15-5 Shibuya.  3 mins from Shibuya Station C2 Exit.  B1F street-facing entrance.  Enter through Sushi Hajime.
Map data ©2024 Google

📅 Visit November 2023

🕛 Lunch 13,000

🥚 Suppon chawanmushi
🐟 Hirame, engawa, Yoichi ankimo ponzu
🐟 Mehikari yakimono
🍣 Sumi ika nigiri
🍣 Amadai shiro
🍣 Hokkigai
🍣 Chutoro
🍣 Sawara zuke
🍣 Katsuo
🍣 Kasugo
🍲 Satoimo mangu ika geso
🍣 Kuruma ebi
🍣 Kohada
🍙 Hokkaido bafun uni temaki
🍙 Unagi temaki
🍲 Owan
🍬 Matcha blancmange

💴 Damage: 13,000 inc. water
⏱️ Time taken: 1h40m