Zip Fusion is a Korean sushi restaurant located within a Latino neighborhood. How’s that for fusion? Zip is the transliteration of the Korean word for "house" or "home," pronounced jeeb. It’s easy to find. It’s right on the corner of East 3rd and Rose Streets. When you walk in, the sushi chefs greet you in Korean. I asked to be seated in the patio area. It’s enclosed so that you don’t get direct sunlight or attract insects with your food. That was a bonus.

My friend and I became lost in our conversation, so the waitress returned several times in order to take our order. Service is excellent here. Our table was wobbling, so our waitress came with some paper coasters from the bar to fix it right away. We ended up ordering from the sushi menu, but there are other menus. I ordered a Zip fusion cocktail, which is a ginseng soju drink. The waitress warned that I may not like it since the ginseng flavoring is very strong. She brought me a sample to try before I ordered. I actually liked the strange concoction, so I went ahead and ordered it. I do believe very few would actually like it, but I happen to like ginseng. My friend wanted a beer, but they were all Korean imports, so I advised her to order the Hite Prime (pronounced "height prime"), since she didn’t want a very light brew nor a dark brew. Upon tasting it, she found it just right. My favorite Korean beers are the Hite Prime and the Stout. What Koreans consider "stout" is not very dark, so it’s in between an amber and a dark brew.

The sushi menu was extensive. We ordered tuna, eel, and sweet shrimp first. Unfortunately, the shrimp did not come in pairs, so I found that a little expensive for one shrimp. The rest of the sushi was very good and a great price. After that we tried some rolls: a BSCR roll, which had baked scallops over a California roll; a caterpillar roll, which had eel and cucumber with avocado on top; and an In & Out tuna roll, which had tuna and avocado on top of the spicy tuna roll in a sauce. I liked all the rolls, except the In & Out roll, since it was sopping in sauce. I didn’t like how wet the roll was. It was beginning to fall apart by the time we ate it.

In general, I found it a great price for all the sushi that we ate. Service was fantastic and the atmosphere was good. The clientele tends to be young, professional Asian-Americans. After some time, someone turned on techno music. As it throbbed throughout the restaurant, I noticed myself starting to move to the pulsating beat. It was fine for me, since I didn’t really mind it, but someone who hates techno music would be really annoyed. Still, the food is definitely worth it.