Description: Japan – 05/08/09Japanese cuisine seems to be very much in vogue in Manchester at present. New Japanese restaurants seem to be opening at a fantastic pace. In the last 12 months alone I can think of Wasabi in the Printworks, Tokyo Season on Portland Street, Sapporo Teppanyaki in Castlefield, and Samsi in Spinningfields. However, I played it safe and headed for the grand-daddy of them all, New Samsi on Whitworth Street (near the Gay Village). This was the pioneer of Japanese dining some 16 years ago, and it is where I usually go when I want to go all Tokyo.
Funny to think that several years ago, the concept of eating raw fish seemed disgustingly alien in Britain. Now you can pick up sushi lunch packs in convenience stores. But it was in New Samsi that I first tried sushi and learned that rather than fearing it I should love it. I have always had good meals here, which is why I chose this as my Japanese venue. And I brought along Paul and Ana, and new squeeze Rebecca for a double date.
Aesthetically,
New Samsi looks the part, with clean wood lines, bamboo and banners, and kimono-waering waitresses and cool black-clad male staff. I requested a table on the upper level. Here there are no chairs as such – the tables are set into recesses in the floor into which you dangle your legs. We nibbled on Wasabi peas and drank ice-cold Asahi as we studied the menu. This is not just limited to sushi, but expands to tenpura, teriyaki, sukiyaki, katsu, and on and on. If anything there is too much choice! And despite my intentions to branch out into other Japanese dishes, I always end up coming back to the
sushi.
One criticism of the sushi is that you cannot really mix and match. You can either order, say, four pieces of the same type of sushi, or you can order a mixed platter, but have no say over what is on that platter. For instance, I quite fancied retrying some
unagi, eel. I had it on my previous visit and found it an odd fish, almost crunchy and crackly like celophane. But at £8.50 for four pieces – and knowing that it would probably just be me eating it – I thought it would be a bit too much. So instead, after a bowl of
miso soup (a very reasonable £2.00) I ordered a mixed sushi & sashimi platter, as did Rebecca. For £12.00 this was great value, even if you could not choose precisely what you would be eating. When delivered the platter consisted of two pieces of fresh salmon sushi, two of purple-tinged octapus sushi (
tako), two prawn sushi (
ebi), two pieces of sushi topped with cooked egg (
tamago), and one piece of sushi topped with glistening squid (
ika). It came with sashimi – slivers of raw fish – two each of mackerel, salmon, and deep plum-coloured tuna. There was also a tofu pouch (which tasted a bit like a deep-fried brown-paper bag of rice pudding to me – I could have done without it), and accompaniments of sweet pickled ginger and hot pistachio-green wasabi (horseradish paste) to mix in with the soy sauce in dipping bowls. This was a really good selection, and an excellent introduction to someone new to sushi. Personally the tofu pouch and the egg sushi were not things I would have personally chosen to order, but it was nice to experience the difference in tastes and textures offered by squid and octopus, as I had always thought of them as being practically identical.
Ana had ordered
teriyaki chicken breast (£9.95).
Teriyaki is where the meat has been prepared in a sweet soy sauce marinade. Paul ordered
samurai skewers, several skewers of chilli-spiced and chargrilled beef (£7.95). Frankly, both those dishes looked great. But I’m still not sure I regret my decision to have sushi.
Paul and I forced ourselves to have dessert. We had noticed that they served Japanese plum wine sorbet. I had ordered this at the Korean restauarant
Koreana and had loved it. Paul had tried a bit of mine there and had been kicking himself ever since for not ordering some for himself. But it came as a ball of shaved ice, tinted a delicate pale purple. Already the syrupy spirit was forming a sticky alcoholic puddle around the sorbet. It was wonderfully palate-cleansing, a cooling, delicate taste, but with enough boozy fumes to anaesthetise a Japanese crane – or a Japanese crane-driver!
As you might have guessed, I love this restaurant. The ingredients are always fresh, the atmosphere simply oozes Japanese style, and the prices are surprisingly reasonable for what you get. It always seems to add just that little something extra to a dining experience. An example is the Samsi Express downstairs, a basement Japanese supermarket for you to buy your own noodles or sushi rice, bottles of Asahi or sake, wall-hangings or Hello Kitty merchandise, dried seaweed or wasabi peas (in fact Paul bought a bag of the latter. And the chain is now spreading across Manchester. As well as their branch in the Spinningfields complex, they have a smaller store called Little Samsi roughly across the street from where I live in Withington which offers up bento boxes at lunch time. New Samsi is certainly a place to take people should you wish to impress them. I’m certainly always impressed!
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