Beyond the cucumber roll Beyond the cucumber roll (March 05, 2004)

Sushi stalwart Masa's still does it well

By Mandy Erickson

To get to Masa's Sushi, drive down San Antonio Road, eyes peeled for a building that looks like it used to be an automotive shop. You'll spot it a few blocks north of El Camino Real: a peaked-roof structure with a liquor store on the right and Dittmer's, the German deli, on the left. Only after you pull into the parking lot will you notice Masa's, squeezed between the booze and the wurst.

Inside, the restaurant is nearly as modest. It's a railcar-style place, with a sushi bar on one side and a single row of tables on the other. The only decorations are wood shingles with Japanese characters -- passports from the samurai era.

But this eatery offers much more than it first appears. Besides the expected tempura and teriyaki, it offers three kinds of miso soup, fried oysters and calamari, tofu appetizers, grilled seafood, salads, plus, of course, sushi. As an added bonus there are two more menus just for specialty sushi.

You may think that Masa's can't do it all, but with a few exceptions, it performs admirably, most notably with the specialty sushi. The rolls are like little presents, wrapped in seaweed, fish or avocado. They are crunchy, sweet, spicy, salty and sometimes all of the above.

I took my husband to Masa's on a Saturday night just before 7 p.m., and we were seated immediately. We ordered edamame ($2.95), three specialty sushi rolls and fried oysters ($7). But it was a cold night, a good one for miso soup, so we also asked the waitress which soup she would recommend: nameko miso (with mushrooms) or ebi miso (with grilled shrimp). She said the nameko was better; we ordered one of each ($3.50).

The edamame arrived first, hot and sprinkled with coarse salt. Biting into the pods was like sipping a margarita: I savored the boiled soybeans' subtle flavor, then licked the salt off my lips.

We had asked for our soup next, but the specialty sushi followed. We were able to forgive the mishap after the first bite. Our favorite was the scorpion roll ($4.75), a cone of crisp seaweed filled with rice, radish sprouts, avocado and fried soft-shell crawfish. The crawfish meat was sweet, the shell crunchy, the sprouts spicy and the avocado buttery. I just barely tipped the roll into my saucer of wasabi and soy sauce, and that's all it needed to reflect a perfect balance of textures and flavors.

The rainbow roll ($9.50) was the next to arrive. It was a California roll (avocado and imitation crab meat) draped with different types of fish -- tuna, shrimp and mackerel -- which makes a fun presentation because you can select the piece with your favorite fish.

Finally, our miso soup arrived, and I disagreed with our waitress about which was better. The ebi miso was the same broth I've known and loved, but improved with an infusion from the ocean. Floating in the soup was one large shrimp in its natural state -- head, tail, shell and all. I was happy to discover it was fresh and perfectly cooked.

The nameko miso was a heartier dish, with rice noodles, tofu, inari (tofu flavored with sugar and soy sauce) and nameko mushrooms, but it was bland.

The fried oysters were a surprise hit -- battered with breadcrumbs and deep-fried, they were artfully arranged on oyster shells and served with tartar sauce. The batter was crisp without being greasy, and the oysters cooked for the perfect amount of time.

The Diane roll ($9.50), next to arrive, was my second favorite of our sushi choices. Named after a customer, the roll is served in the classic log-style with scallops, real crab meat, shrimp tempura, flying fish roe and a slightly spicy, slightly sweet sauce.

We washed all this sushi down with a glass of the house sake Mujyouhai. Masa's sake menu boasts as many pages as does a wine list in a pretentious French restaurant.

We had asked for our sake to be room temperature, but it arrived ice-cold. I liked it that way, though; fruity and medium dry, it was like a delicate Chardonnay. The glass arrived inside a wooden box, the sake both inside the glass and surrounding it. The presentation is a throwback to an earlier time, when the Japanese drank from wooden boxes.

I can never leave a restaurant without trying dessert, so I ordered the mochi ice cream ($2.50). A small ball of ice cream, your flavor of choice, is wrapped in mochi, a rice-flour pastry. The red bean mochi was not too sweet with a subtle red bean taste. The mochi is chewy and a nice foil for the slick ice cream.

I returned to Masa's with a friend a few days later to sample more standard lunchtime fare. The bento box ($7.35), with chicken teriyaki and tempura, was an obvious choice. The chicken was some of the best teriyaki I've had -- the meat was moist with a smoky, grilled flavor, and the sauce just the right level of sweetness.

The tempura batter was thin and light but not as crisp as I'd like. The requisite salad was a mix of baby greens with creamy sesame dressing. It was fine as Japanese salads go, but my favorite of the bento box side dishes was the tiny pile of spicy pickled bean sprouts which had a great crunch.

My dining companion is a mackerel aficionado, and she declared Masa's mackerel ($5) to be on par with the best anywhere: not too salty, moist, grilled -- and served in a generous portion.

I was disappointed, however, in the cold spinach ($3.50). Beautifully presented in a square bowl, dotted with sesame seeds and topped with a tangle of shaved carrots, the spinach was too watery to hold the flavor of the dressing.

But the disappointments were few at Masa's. After 13 years at the helm of the restaurant, chef Masa Uehara is still turning out sumptuous sushi. And once you eat your way through the extensive menu, you'll find new items appearing frequently -- Uehara introduces new sushi creations once or twice a month.

Dining Notes

Masa's Sushi
400 San Antonio Road
941-2117
Lunch: Monday-Friday 11:30 a.m.-2:30 p.m.
Dinner: Daily 5 p.m.-9:30 p.m.

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