On our way to Costco yesterday my wife decided to treat us to sushi for lunch. It's not really a treat, as we usually eat sushi once a week, but this time it was different than others. This time we had a chance to try maguro(tuna) from Ireland.
The sushi restaurant we stopped at, 2 doors away from Costco, is called Sushi-Ro. It's one of the biggest chain sushi restaurants in Japan. The McDonald's of sushi you could say, but better quality.
While we were waiting we noticed an interesting advertisement, maguro set from Ireland. I have to say I have never had any sushi from Ireland before and was a bit skeptical to be honest. Would it be fishy? Lower quality than that from around Japan? We had to find out.
Before that though, another thing happened while we were waiting. My wife and I were showing our daughter some of the gotcha(capsule) machines and saw one of them had some funny characters, cats fishing.
These gotcha machines are crazy. You can find miniature anything in them and lots of them are downright crazy. I've been taking pictures of a bunch I'll post about later.
Then it was time to eat. Of course we ordered the Ireland maguro first.
The appearance was quite nice, but how was the flavor and texture?
First let me explain the cuts. The little sign says "Ireland" in red. Black says Tennen Hon Maguro which translates to natural tuna, not farm raise. Then from left to right we have O-toro, fatty tuna, Chu-toro, medium fatty and nakaochi, scraped meat between the bones.
(O-toro)
I had the O-toro, while my wife had the chu-toro. The O-toro was absolutely delicious. It melted in my mouth and had excellent flavor without a hint of fishiness. I was very surprised as I had expected it to be lower quality than the maguro I usually eat here.
Next up I had the nakaochi with sesame seeds. This was also delicious! The sesame added an additional element to an already delicious nakaochi. Keep in mind, this sushi restaurant is basically fast food so to have this quality sushi at a good price, $5.80, was quite surprising. So much so, we decided to order a second dish of this.
While waiting for the second round of Ireland maguro to come we got on with our usual sushi.
Negi-toro
Monk fish liver for the Mrs.
More monk liver with ponzu jelly.
French fries & sushi!
My wife's uni udon.
Someone else's giant ebi fry.
This funny fried fish over 4 pieces of sushi rice.
Our second serving of Ireland maguro came and it tasted just as delicious as the first batch.
I let my wife have the o-toro this time and I had the chu-toro. The chu-toro wasn't as delicious as the o-toro, but it was still very good.
After having our fill of better than we expected fish, it was time for desert! One of the deserts was right up my alley, caramel & almond on chocolate cake with butter ice cream & whipped cream!
This too was delicious. Everything paired together was gone in a few seconds as my wife and I fought over the dish.
While Sushi-Ro is usually just normal, nothing special, this time around was a pleasant surprise. It put us in the mood to go shopping for more food next door at Costco. I'll tell you how that went another time.
When we got home my wife & daughter set up our fishing cat on top of our opalized petrified wood.
