Masayoshi
4376 Fraser
604-428-6272
Facebook.com/MasayoshiSushi
Open for dinner Monday-Saturday from 5:00pm.
Masayoshi Baba has a playful approach when it comes to high-end sushi. The chef/co-owner of the three-month-old Masayoshi on Fraser Street was stamping out goldfish shapes from shaved carrot one night while I sat at the bar. When asked what they were for, he answered, “Candles!” More specifically, they were decorations for the daikon candle holders he made by creating wide thin curls of the radish, then plastering the slightly blanched carrot-fish to the inside. A tiny birthday candle sat in a daikon base, the decorated curl went around, and, presto, daikon candle with “swimming” goldfish. The reason? “Just for fun,” replies his business partner and GM, Tomohisa Uchida, grinning.
That sense of fun extends throughout the menu. Dashi ($18 for two or three people) is made using a coffee siphon. The top half is loaded with dried bonito flakes, shitake, sardine and kelp, sprinkled with salt and splashed with sake, plus a few drops of soy sauce to start, then the liquid gets added. Once it’s “steeped,” the broth filters down into the base. The result is a dashi that is extremely clean and ridiculously fragrant, with umami for days. It’s a dish that speaks to a solid kitchen technique; hardly surprising considering the two owners’ background.
Baba worked as a sushi chef at Tojo’s for over a decade. That’s where he met Uchida, who started there in 2009, straight out of hotel management school. The two have turned a tiny room (less than 20 seats) into a cozy, minimalist space that turns out some seriously elegant food. Some hiccups in service in their first few weeks seem to be smoothing out, and the food is consistently excellent.
A dish off the omakase menu one night (for $80 or $100) yielded black cod marinated in a surprising combination of soy, millet jelly, mirin and sake. Decorated with a fried lotus root chip and a purple potato curl, it even has a pinch of gold leaf. “It’s fancy,” says Uchida, laughing. Fancy or not, it’s delicious. The fish just flakes apart at the touch of my chopstick and melts in a warm, savoury breath on the tongue.
Be warned, parts of the menu are definitely not Ocean Wise—not even close. The quality of the seafood is superb, but the blue fin tuna (“the king of tuna” in Japan) has long been overfished, and the red rockfish isn’t much better in terms of sustainability. But, if you want some really amazing snapper, mackerel or wild salmon, you won’t go wrong here.
Freshly-prepared unagi (barbecued eel) in a roll with cucumber ($8) is topped with perfectly scalloped avocado. The sushi rice is made just before the start of service at 5pm, and it’s warm, not overly seasoned or sweet, and a perfect balance to the fish. A vegetarian roll of pickled plum and cucumber ($5.50) is another standout.
If there’s one dish to not miss, it would be the chawanmushi ($12). Served with a perfectly carved wooden spoon, the savoury steamed egg custard is loaded with pine mushroom, kelp, shrimp, unagi, ginkgo, chicken and edamame. It was my last course one night, and rendered dessert unnecessary.
There is dessert if you want it. A matcha cheese cake another night ($3.50) is a tiny glass of cake and heavy, housemade cream, with a small black sesame biscuit on top. It’s perfect; a rich and not-overly-sweet finish that balances out the clean dashi from the start of the meal.
Masayoshi’s prices aren’t the rock-bottom ones that Vancouverites typically expect from their sushi joints, but the quality of the ingredients and the cookery is well beyond its value. It’s a happy addition to the small list of upscale Japanese restaurants in the city, and a boon for the Fraserhood.
All ratings out of five stars.
Food: ★★★★
Service: ★★★
Ambiance: ★★★
Value: ★★★★
Overall: ★★★ 1/2
Hear Anya Levykh every Monday on CBC Radio One’s On the Coast. Find her on Twitter @foodgirlfriday and Facebook.com/FoodGirlFriday.
Rating guide:
★: Okay, nothing memorable.
★★: Good, shows promise.
★★★: Very good, occasionally excellent.
★★★★: Excellent, consistently above average.
★★★★★: Awe-inspiring, practically perfect in every way.
