I've been waiting until a Friday to review Sushi Shack because they feature a FrankenFood that I have been excited to try ever since I saw a video of one from New York on Facebook ages ago: The Sushi Burrito.
I'll do a brief review of the restaurant and its other fare before diving into the insanity that is the Sushi Burrito to give you a fair opinion of Sushi Shack itself.
They are perhaps best known for their excellent all you can eat fresh sushi deals, which is only $10.99 at lunchtime. The catch, of course, is that you have to eat everything on your plate before eating more, and you reach about your fullness level after 2 whole rolls, which you may have been able to purchase individually for about $11 anyway. Still, it's a really great deal and allows for a lot of variety if you go with several people and all share several different rolls.
The all-you-can-eat meal also comes with salad from their modest buffet, and miso soup.
What you need to keep in mind at Sushi Shack is the price and value. I have a good friend who is a Japanese teacher, and has had some of the best sushi Japan has to offer, and needless to say she has extremely high standards for the quality of the fish that is served in her sushi. I am not sure that I would take her to Sushi Shack, because at the prices they offer, obviously they are not going to serve the breath-of-Poseidon quality of fish that a significantly more expensive sushi restaurant offers.
Still, for about $25 a couple can enjoy a varied, filling, delicious meal of sushi that far exceeds the quality of anything you would ever expect in that price range. For my husband and I, it has been a really fun treat to have a place we can go for affordable sushi on our budget that is good and fresh!
Some people understandably assume that the quality of the fish must be affected when a restaurant's prices are so low. In some ways, that is a fair assumption- often, though I do not know in the case of Sushi Shack, especially in the middle of Texas, hundreds of miles from the ocean, sushi-grade fish has been frozen for transportation and thawed to serve. This process often takes some of the flavor out of the fish, making it milder. Still, such a process is a completely legitimate practice in maintaining the safety and serve-ability of meat products such as raw fish, and are one of the only ways to make such products available at a price point below $15-$20/roll.
I am in no way asserting for certain that Sushi Shack uses fish that has been shipped frozen- I do not know! But my point is this: a slightly lower priced piece of sushi does not need to be regarded as "sketchy" purely based on price. Thawed-from-frozen fish is as safe to eat as fresh fish on the coast, sometimes even safer because it doesn't need to be thawed long before it is served, and is in that way at times much fresher than fish that was caught the day before and left aging in a fridge until it was served. I have known chefs who prefer thawed-from-frozen fish any time they can't smell the ocean from the front door of the restaurant because they can trust its safety more.
This blog is meant to inform and educate, and I digress on this point because I want people to be fair to establishments in this price bracket, and not assume that because it was a great price, that the quality and safety of the food must have suffered. I think that can really be unfair to establishments that may take a lower profit to provide competitive prices. I for one have eaten at Sushi Shack 4 times, at all different times of year including the dead heat of summer, and have never tasted anything less than fresh or felt anything less than full and satisfied after I had eaten, and I am always amazed at how easy it was to stay in budget.
Now for what you've all been waiting for! The Sushi Burrito.
This "burrito" is wrapped in pink rice paper, and stuffed with sushi rice, shredded crab (real, not artificial), tuna, salmon, and avocado. It really is, as one would expect, basically a gigantic roll of sushi. Still, the FrankenFood gimmick, while perhaps somewhat unnecessary, is a fun one.
It is also an excellent bite of food, combining three of my favorite sushi meats into one bite. I did find myself missing a crunch or a chew after I got about halfway through, and would have enjoyed a bit of seaweed or cucumber to break up the soft upon soft upon soft texture of the meal.
Still, overall it was a great deal for the price, very filling and fresh, and a lot of fun to eat. I think it is definitely worth trying for the sake of saying you have, one of those culinary bucket list items. It is also significantly more successful than most FrankenFoods at combining the defining elements of both inspiring dishes to create a new distinct hybrid of both, and in so doing accomplishing something that is not only edible, but actually fun, delicious, and something you actually want to finish.
Finally, let me just say- the staff are darling and provide such friendly and excellent service. I was delighted at the end of my last dinner there when the waitress brought out this with our check:
So go check it out! Remember the price point, and enjoy a good plate of sushi with a friend.
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