Sticks N Sushi

Turning a hater into a believer

Opening Ramble:

I have many feelings about Sushi, hardly any of them positive. I’m more or less ambivalent about sticks. So going to a restaurant named Sticks ‘N’ Sushi was never really on the cards. Until one fateful day, when my friend Claire recommended SNS to my partner as a legit sushi place in London. Supposedly a rarity in London. You can get very cheap trash sushi and very expensive sushi, but the mid level, good quality for a decent price, is sorely lacking in the London sushi scene. I think my North Indian and British upbringing doesn’t lend itself to sushi either. You got a fish? Deep fry it and serve it with potatoes as God intended. The biggest challenge, aside from the “fishy” taste and the raw meat texture, is it’s just not something I was ever exposed to and it feels alien whenever I try it. Stark contrast to my partner’s Californian upbringing where the Japanese have brought their expertise and delivered sushi at all levels. So when it came to my partner’s birthday, she had only one request and I had to oblige. What follows is nothing short of a miracle, let’s get rolling with the review!

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The Order (dishes as described on the menu):

Starters - Perfect Day Platter

1. Edamame
   Soya beans with sea salt

   Rating : 10/10

2. Shake Tataki
   Salmon, kizami wasabi and ponzu

   Rating : 7.2/10

3. Karaage
   Chicken & Pickled red onion with wasabi caesar
   Rating : 8.6/10

Mains - Perfect Day Platter

Sticks

1. Buta Yaki
   Organic free-range pork yuzu miso

   Rating : 6.0/10

2. Shake Teriyaki
   Salmon, teriyaki & spring onion

   Rating : 6.2/10

3. Tsukune
   Chicken Meatballs & teriyaki
   Rating : 5.5/10

Sushi

1. Nigiri Shake Yaki
   Seared Salmon

   Rating : 7.8/10

2. Nigiri Maguro
   Yellowfin Tuna

   Rating : 8.2/10

3. Nigiri Abokado
   Avocado, yuzu kosho & sesame

   Rating : 8.1/10

4. Crispy Ebi
   Tempura Shrimp, avocado, spicy sauce & tsume soya

   Rating : 8.9/10

5. Spicy Tuna
   Tuna, cucumber, spicy sauce, masago, kataifi & herbs

   Rating : 8.7/10

6. Rice Paper
   Duck, pickled red onion, avocado, cucumber & coriander served with goma

   Rating : 7.7/10

£82 for all of the above, 2 person sharing platter¹

Dessert

1. Shabetto
   A sorbet trio, Sun riped Alphonso Mango, Chocolate & Avola Almonds, Blackcurrants picked from Thy in Denmark

   £6 Rating : 7.3/10

Drinks

1. Tokubetsu Junmai, Nanbu Bijin, Iwate (15.5%)
   Light and clean with sweet notes of melon & pear, with plenty of umami and depth
   £9 Rating : 8.7/10

2. Blackberry Mule
   Bacardi Oro rum and Moose blackberry liqueur muddled with fresh lime, mint leaves & sugar, topped with Artisan fiery ginger beer.
   £13 Rating : 8.4/10

Total Bill incl tip: £120.37

Overall Rating: 7.82/10

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Review:

The Vibe:

First thing that hits you when you enter is how dark the room is. I’m assuming it’s for #thelovers because there was a brighter section for families and larger groups in the back. I was very envious of the brighter section because the lighting was so much better. Our area was horrific for taking pictures, which I usually don’t mind for a restaurant, but won’t someone think about the substackers!!! It’s probably better if a restaurant doesn’t encourage you to take pics and be “in the moment”. Because of the lighting, I’m not really sure what the rest of the vibe was honestly…Seemed like any other upscale adjacent restaurant. The staff were fairly efficient throughout; cleaning up very quickly and once the food started rolling, the service was very prompt and a decent level of pleasantries were exchanged. Only time they were slacking was when the bill was required, ironically when I was bloated and looking for an escape home. But that was also when the larger groups started really pouring in so I don’t ding the staff too much for that.

The Food - Starters:

Is it even possible to mess up Miso soup ? It’s savoury nectar from the heavens. Simple, clean salty, savoury and umami flavours by the spoonful. A great appetite whetter. Sensational way to start the evening.²

1. Edamame
   Soya beans with sea salt

2. Karaage
   Chicken & Pickled red onion with wasabi caesar

Similarly you can’t really mess up Edamame (left side below).³ Either you’re into it or not. My partner and I are big fans of Edamame, add some flaky sea salt with some lemon drizzled on top, we inhaled those delicious beany pods.

The Karaage however, was where things started to get interesting. Don’t get it twisted, the chicken was some of the best fried chicken I’ve ever had. Juicy and moist, with a perfectly fried crunchy crackly crust, it was amazing. Add in some of the pickled red onion and it’s a flavourful and fried delight. The wasabi caesar dressing however, was a myth. It was on the menu but surely we didn’t receive it. What we got instead was a fairly bland, green dressing that would honestly make more sense if they called it St Patrick’s Day Mayo. I know some restaurants defraud us with horseradish and green dye and call it wasabi, but I think they left out the horseradish this time too. Skip the dressing and you’ll have a great time!

3. Shake Tataki
   Salmon, kizami wasabi and ponzu

Now we get into the real stuff; My first challenge. I’m comfortable having fish with rice, but opening with just a slab of fish…. I didn't get nervous but did I get a bit shaky…

It was delicious! The fatty fish paired really well with the sharp citrusy ponzu and fiery wasabi. That’s the flavour done. Texturally however, it was a different story. The raw thickness of the fish, even if it was delicious, meant I couldn’t handle beyond a small dose. Those who grew up with sushi however, get down and get merry.

The Food - Mains

Sushi

Because it’s a platter, I’m going to give you a short summary for each dish, otherwise we’ll be bumping against the Substack word limit the whole time.⁴

1. Nigiri Shake Yaki
   Seared Salmon

   It was good but basic, it’s hard for me to get uber verbose about this one. It was good quality fish, I know that for sure.

2. Nigiri Maguro
   Yellowfin Tuna

   Honestly just see above. Add your soy, wasabi and ginger dressing combos to enliven it but it’s difficult to wax lyrical about it.

3. Nigiri Abokado
   Avocado, yuzu kosho & sesame

   I’m assuming this was designed as a palate cleanser because the yuzu and sesame was really refreshing but there wasn’t much more substance to this piece.

4. Crispy Ebi
   Tempura Shrimp, avocado, spicy sauce & tsume soya

   My favourite thing I had on this platter. I could have had about 20 of these. I’m not even a shrimp fan, or so I thought! Turns out I was just having overcooked, trash shrimp. The lightly fried tempura was excellent and provided the perfect textural counter balance to the creamy avocado. The spicy sauce left your mouth watering and wanting MORE. Pitched at the exact right level of spicy to make you notice but not overpower the rest of the piece. Cannot emphasize how life changing this sushi was.

5. Spicy Tuna
   Tuna, cucumber, spicy sauce, masago, kataifi & herbs

   Turns out I love masago (or smelt roe).⁵ I found out it was roe/fish eggs in the process of writing this post. I’m shocked. Growing up, I couldn’t have imagined this is where I would be. Extolling the virtues of fish eggs but it was incredible. It provided a poppable texture and combined with the kataifa (crispy pastry sticks), it added a brand new element to sushi that I loved. It made the fatty tuna and spicy sauce so much more interesting to me. The cucumber then came in and cleansed your palate. It kept the whole affair lighter than it probably was and made you think, “yeah maybe I should have 3 more.” Reflecting on it, you should probably have many more, it was that good.

6. Rice Paper
   Duck, pickled red onion, avocado, cucumber & coriander served with goma

   Honestly, this one was the main attraction for me when we ordered the platter. I wasn’t sure I would like anything else so I thought okay, I’ll just hang on the duck corner. But after tasting the other sushi first, I was let down by the Rice Paper. It was fine and probably even good but nothing really popped. I wanted the pickled red onion to be sharper and the duck to be really gamey and it just wasn’t. It was also just a disintegrating mess, which was highly tedious. You had to scoop it back together and hope you didn’t drop anything. Maybe this was a case of raised expectations and then ultimately being let down. I’d try it again, so clearly it wasn’t that bad.

Sticks

My gameplan going into the evening was take what you can with the sushi, you might like something but stuff yourself with sticks. Thank god this game plan was rendered redundant because I couldn’t believe how disappointing the sticks were.

1. Buta Yaki (Pork)
   I saw on the menu, pork meatballs, and thought “well that’s a safe dish for me”. I was hopeful the Yuzu and Miso would elevate the dish to a higher culinary plane. Sadly, it stayed on a very basic plain level. The Miso and Yuzu were sparingly used because it didn’t make much of an impression. My partner was out on these simply from the smell, so yeah more miss than hit .

2. Shake Teriyaki (Salmon)
   An instantly forgettable dish. Who would have thought, I would find the cooked fish the least appetising but that’s where we find ourselves.

3. Tsukune (Chicken)
   The worst stick by far. The teriyaki felt like it had been reduced too far and it resulted in a sickly sweet sauce. Given chicken doesn’t have tremendous flavour on it’s own, it was deeply unpleasant all around. This dish beat 30 years of ingrained training to always finish your plate, that’s how bad it was.

Dessert

After finishing the platter, we were stuffed to our gills, so thought a sorbet would get the digestion process moving. I’m not sure of the actual science but if you have knowledge to the contrary, keep it to yourself. Don’t be the person who blocks people getting treats. Now onto the sorbets, you can see the freezer burner on the tops of each flavour. Once it starts to melt, they start to taste better by dint of the fact you can actually put your spoon into the ramekins! They were so frozen solid I think that’s what caused some broken bits of ramekin to get into my sorbet.⁶ Once you can get into it, my rankings of the flavours are as follows:

1. Blackcurrant - The least frozen and provided the best sharp and cleansing delight that a sorbet should!

2. Alphonso Mango - Delicious once defrosted, but badly affected by the freezer burn at parts, resulting in watery sorbet.

3. Chocolate & Avola Almonds - Needed more almonds and it was most affected by being completely rock solid

Conclusion

I had an unexpectedly great time at Sticks “N” Sushi. Honestly it was a life changing experience for me as a Sushi novice. I’m going to wade much further into that fishy sea and with a lot less trepidation thanks to SNS. For that, they earn tremendous credit. When I come back, I sincerely hope they fix their sticks though, because they were really in danger of ruining the meal for me. Pricewise I thought the platter was extraordinary value. It could easily be split across 3/4 people and for the level of sushi quality, good value for money too. So I’ll leave with this thought; Come for the sushi and leave the sticks…Me advocating for sushi, what a world. On that bombshell, I bid you adieu.

Drinks

This week’s bonus content will be my drinks reviews!