The evolution of sushi reaches town

Greer Wylder

At Kura Sushi, once customers touch a plate, it’s theirs. Customers

watch covered plates travel around the sushi bar and pass by booths,

helping themselves to cut rolls, edamame, desserts and even kid’s

toys. A gliding belt moves at 8 centimeters per second, which was

proved through testing to be the right speed for grabbing plates.

The novelty, new to Costa Mesa, is the craze in Japan, where more

than 5,000 kaiten sushi restaurants serve plates on conveyor belts.

The commonplace trend, first introduced in Osaka in the late 1950s,

revolutionized the sushi industry. For the first time, sushi

restaurants could manage on smaller staffs and serve sushi at budget

prices.

More recently, through advanced technology, computers could

determine freshness of each sushi plate. An attached computer chip on

the bottom side of each plate encodes the content of each plate and

how long it should stay on the belt. Time limits vary with cooked or

raw fish. After the plate has traveled long enough on the belt, it’s

automatically discarded.

Co-owner Ken Oyadomari says Kura Sushi is the first restaurant on

the West Coast that implements this computer system. Oyadomari, who

also owns a chain of Teppan (Benihana-style) restaurants called

Yamato throughout Southern California, says this casual, fun way to

eat sushi is also affordable.

“It’s cheap but not cheap quality,” Oyadomari said.

Kura Sushi has fresh fish delivered six days a week. Each

color-coded plate has a pre-determined price ($1.45, $1.95, $2.45 and

$3.45). After the meal, servers add up the number of plates and bill

the table accordingly.

For just a few dollars, customers can choose between yellowtail

cut rolls, spicy salmon cut rolls, caterpillar rolls and rainbow

rolls. They also make nigiri (individual pieces) that include eel,

hokki clam, octopus and tuna sushi. Hand rolls and other specialty

sushi rolls have to be ordered, and Kura Sushi offers a regular menu

for those who want other Japanese dishes.

There’s a selection of salads, but unfortunately they comprise

mostly iceberg lettuce. The choices include an oversized salmon skin

salad ($4.50); cut-tofu salad ($3.95); and cucumber sunomono ($2.50).

Other dishes include shrimp tempura ($3.95), vegetable tempura

($3.50), squid tempura ($4.50) and sweet potato tempura ($3.50), as

well as chicken teriyaki ($4.50), salmon teriyaki ($7.95) and beef

teriyaki ($7.95). Thick, white, wheat udon noodle entrees range from

kitsune (fried bean curd) ($6.50) to wakame (seaweed) ($6.50) and

nobeyaki, a tangle of chicken, shrimp, silky-soft egg and vegetables

($8.50).

Six busy sushi chefs replace Kura Sushi’s dishes quickly. The

contemporary-designed restaurant seats 80 people. It’s open for lunch

and dinner all day.

* BEST BITES runs every Friday. Greer Wylder can be reached at

greerwylder@yahoo.com; at 330 W. Bay St., Costa Mesa, CA 92627; or by

fax at (949) 646-4170.