The Weekly Eater Nadine Kam

All-you-can-eat
ain’t that much if
you eat all your rice

---

I was worried for the young men behind Sushi Supreme when I heard about their lunch proposal: all-you-can-eat sushi for $12.95 per person. I rarely feel I can eat my share of other all-you-can-eat menus, but I am perfectly capable of downing at least $50 worth of sushi in a sitting, so walking into the 1150 Bishop St. premises, formerly Kozo Sushi, I felt a twinge of pity for these guys, mere babes at 27 to 30 years old.

"How can you guys make money like that?" I asked somberly.

The guy stirring the red miso soup never looked up from his work but flashed a sly grin. "We can," he said.

I needn't have worried about the business plan. What I thought would be a quickie, grab-a-plateful affair, turned into a civilized, leisurely sitdown lunch to order.

KEN IGE / KIGE@STARBULLETIN.COM Sushi Supreme corporate chef Brandan Bandith fixed up Assorted Nigiri Sushi, part of an all-you-can-eat lunch.

There are rules that make this enterprise possible. No. 1 in my mind is a familiar one in virtually every Hawaii household, and that is: All rice must be eaten.

You're allowed to order up to five items at a time (no sharing), and you can't order anymore unless every scrap of rice is gone, which made me realize how much -- toward the end of any sushi meal -- rice I leave behind. (Bad Chinese daughter!)

There are only about 14 seats in the upstairs dining room that opened Aug. 1. The owners had waited to settle in over 30 days before expanding from their take-out counter, where nigiri is priced from $1.50 to $3 per two-piece order, and the specialty rolls are $6.50 per eight pieces. Salads run $2.95 to $6.50 for soft-shell crab and asparagus, and a salmon salad sandwich runs $4.50.

Smart clientele call ahead to reserve the rare seats. Luckily, I looked famished so they made extra room by moving chairs designated for take-out customers.

It was a thrill to be in this building, which, due to its narrow form, reminded me of a mini tribute to New York's Flatiron Building, which I find more intriguing than the idea of reaching the heights of the Empire State Building or Statue of Liberty crown. From inside Sushi Supreme there's not much of a view, but it's cozy and charming. Some might feel cramped in the stark white room, but I felt comfortable, even though private conversations are impossible in the elbow-to-elbow quarters.

THE PRINCIPALS involved in this endeavor are Shannon Akazawa and Grant Kawasaki, who met under less than stellar circumstances. Akazawa was working at a club and kept Kawasaki waiting 45 minutes for a sushi order. Kawasaki said Akazawa had forgotten about his order while "checking out some girls."

There are no such distractions at Sushi Supreme, as the guys got serious and got busy after realizing Akazawa's sushi experience meshed well with Kawasaki's cooking, and made for an unbeatable combination at catered events at the Aloha Stadium, Hawai'i Convention Center and in supplying major hotels. With their wholesale business booming, branching out to a storefront site was a natural progression.

So far so good, such that this is one of the few restaurants you pay $2 at lunch time for NOT eating, as another of the rules is you must finish a bowl of red miso soup and a mesclun salad. (This rule disappears with the pricier dinner special.) You know how filling soup is, but, Kawasaki said, "People don't mind because it tastes good."

That's true on both counts, as the mesclun is topped by a soy-sesame and sweet miso vinaigrettes for a combination of flavors that fire up the tastebuds.

From there you'll probably start following your own rules, such as avoiding the rice-laden handrolls, though these are much daintier than the logs served at some fast-food sushi restaurants. This surprised me, because for the price, I expected to receive one giant handroll after another.

As an alternative to the five sushi orders, you can place a single all-in-one order for chirashi, a bowl of rice topped by maguro, hamachi, salmon, ebi, tako, tamago, unagi, spicy tuna and furikake.

Otherwise, order any of the above in the form of nigiri sushi, which seemed to have more rice than usual, but maybe it's only because, like I said, I'm accustomed to throwing half the rice away. Other nigiri selections are shiromi (white fish), ika (squid) and hokkigai (clam).

For those who fantasize about eating this joint into the ground, the wicked Creamy Ahi Dynamite will be your downfall. The dish starts with eight pieces of inside-out California roll, which is baked with a layer of creamy ahi, masago (smelt roe) aioli, a sweet unagi glaze and Thai sweet chili sauce.

Polishing off this confection, ordered at every table, doesn't leave much room for other items, particularly if your picks run to specialty rolls such as the caterpillar (eel and avocado), rainbow (California roll topped with ahi, tai, ebi and salmon) or dragon (California topped with eel) rolls.

The end result is you'll probably pay as much as you would at a conveyor belt sushi restaurant, and $12.95 is double the $5 or $6 people typically pay for a plate lunch, but a visit to Sushi Supreme is a treat any afternoon.

After ingesting only about two-thirds of the minimum order, I was too stuffed to inquire about desserts, which I later found they don't typically offer outside of special occasions.

Sushi Supreme

1150 Bishop St. / 531-9000 for takeout; 535-9494 for catering

Food
Service
Ambience
Value

Hours: Takeout 10 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Mondays to Fridays; lunch 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Mondays to Fridays; dinner 5 to 9 p.m. Tuesdays to Sundays
Cost: Lunch all-you-can-eat $12.95 per person; dinner all-you-can-eat $20.95 per person; a la carte starts at $1.50 per two pieces nigiri sushi

---

Nadine Kam's restaurant reviews are conducted anonymously and paid for by the Star-Bulletin.

---

See some past restaurant reviews in the Columnists section.

---

Nadine Kam's restaurant reviews are conducted anonymously and paid for by the Star-Bulletin. Star ratings are based on comparisons of similar restaurants:

	excellent;
	very good, exceeds expectations;
	average;
	below average.

To recommend a restaurant, write: The Weekly Eater, P.O. Box 3080, Honolulu, Hawaii 96802. Or send e-mail to nkam@starbulletin.com

---