Ski Town Sushi
Photography: Mark Maziarz
Fresh, raw fish isn’t something you’d expect to find in abundance in a land-locked ski town like Park City. Yet thanks in part to same-day and overnight delivery and shipping, sushi has become a culinary staple on Main Street and beyond. Where steakhouses once ruled the roost, sushi bars now seem to spring up quicker than wildflowers in June. In Park City alone, there are at least a half-dozen restaurants specializing in sushi. Many more restaurants, and even local supermarkets, offer sushi rolls, sashimi, or nigiri on a daily basis.
It all began nearly two decades ago when Peggi Whiting opened Ichiban Sushi on Main Street, in the location that is now home to Kampai. Ichiban begat Mikado and Kampai, followed by local favorite sushi haunts like Blind Dog Sushi, The Flying Sumo, and more recently, Shabu, Sushi Maru, and The Hideaway. If you’re a sushi lover, Park City has suddenly become the place for you.
Chef Michael (“Mikey”) Aguilar-Okumura had opened or worked in just about all of the sushi restaurants in town before opening his own place a year ago, Sushi Maru. “The sushi explosion began with Ichiban Sushi in 1987,” says Mikey. He would know; he worked there as a sushi chef. When asked to account for the Park City sushi explosion, he says, “People here are very active and health-conscious. Many of them are looking for lower fat, high-protein types of cuisine and sushi is perfect for that.”
But don’t get the idea that sushi is just raw fish, says Shabu’s Matt Fisher, another longtime Park City sushi chef. “Sushi” actually refers to the sticky mixture of rice, vinegar, salt, and sugar used to form sushi rolls, which come in three types: nigiri, maki, and temaki. Maki sushi is what we’re most familiar with: rolled sushi with a nori (seaweed) wrapper around raw fish, vegetables, tempura, and the like. Nigiri sushi is the small “finger” roll with a single slice of raw or cooked fish or seafood on top of a bite-size mound of rice. Temaki sushi is a “hand” roll, usually a cone-shaped nori wrapper stuffed with various raw or cooked fillings. Sashimi, on the other hand, is delicately sliced raw fish without any rice.
While many sushi chefs are sticklers about sushi etiquette, The Hideaway’s Josh Copelin doesn’t care so much. “People are intimidated enough by having to order and eat in front of a chef at a sushi bar,” he says. “The last thing I want to do is tell them how to eat their food!” The Hideaway’s chef is more than happy to educate curious customers about sushi and sushi etiquette—sashimi should be eaten with chopsticks, for example—and it’s OK to use your fingers with sushi rolls. But overall, Copelin believes in being “gracious” toward his guests. “They paid for their meal; they can eat it any way they please,” he says with a laugh. “After all, a chef in a French restaurant would never come out and tell you how to eat your food, would he?”
Hapa Grill’s Stan Battle offers a tip in how to avoid being spotted as a sushi rookie: “People tend to sit down and pull apart their wooden chopsticks and then rub them together to shave off rough spots or splinters,” says Battle. “For some reason, people think that’s the tradition. But, in fact, it’s an insinuation that the sushi chef would give a customer cheap chopsticks; it’s sort of an insult. Also, rookies often put their shaved ginger on top of the sushi. It’s really meant as a palate cleanser between bites.” Another breach of sushi etiquette is to offer money to a sushi chef. While tips always make sushi chefs happy, all monetary transactions should be handled via a server, since the sushi chef must keep his or her hands scrupulously clean and sanitary. After all, would you want your sushi chef handling a pile of well-used greenbacks?
As more and more sushi lovers tackle sushi making at home, Sushi Maru’s Mike Aguilar-Okumura admonishes wannabe home sushi chefs to “Learn the rice! It’s the most important sushi ingredient,” he says. “Anyone can learn to cut up fish for sushi rolls, but making the sushi rice correctly is a real art.” Shabu’s Matt Fisher advises rounding up the very best and freshest ingredients. “Since there are no dockside fish stores here in Park City, you need to search out the freshest fish possible at specialty shops like Deep Blue Seafood. You don’t want to make sushi with anything but the freshest fish.”
From the traditional Japanese sushi and sashimi found at restaurants like Kampai, Flying Sumo and Sushi Maru, to the modernist fusion-sushi of Shabu, Hapa Grill, The Hideaway, and the Blind Dog, it’s easy to see that something very fishy is going on in Park City.
Ted Scheffler writes about food and wine, lives in Park City, and is known to eat raw and almost-raw fish.
The Raw and the Cooked: (Top picks at area sushi joints)
Blind Dog Restaurant & Sushi
1781 Sidewinder Drive, 435.655.0800
Raw: Sea urchin (uni)
Cooked: Grilled ahi tuna chop with fava bean, heirloom tomato and blueberry succotash
The Hideaway
4070 Willow Draw Drive (in the Miner’s Club at the Canyons), 435.645.4400
Raw: Wasatch Roll with spicy salmon, yellowtail, cucumber, and tobiko
Cooked: Surf & Turf with beef filet and crab
The Flying Sumo
838 Park Avenue 435.649.5522
Raw: Poki tuna salad with fresh tuna tossed in spicy Hawaiian dressing, seasonal greens, seaweed, daikon, carrots, and radish sprouts
Cooked: Sautéed veggies and pan-fried yakisoba noodles with beef or chicken
Hapa Grill
1571 W. Redstone Center Drive #140, 435.575.HAPA
Raw: sashimi toro (fatty tuna)
Cooked: Tosh’s Po’ Boy sandwich with jumbo prawns, homemade tartar sauce and tonkatsu
Kampai
586 Main Street, 435.649.0655
Raw: Raw giant clam (mirugai) and smelt eggs (masago)
Cooked: Shishito peppers, tempura style with bonito flakes and ponzu
Shabu
333 Main Street (Main Street Mall), 435.645.SAKE
Raw: Unagi roll with fresh water eel, scallions, and teriyaki sauce
Cooked: Coconut crusted tofu with Shabu sauce
Sushi Maru
1776 Park Avenue, 435.615.8862
Raw: Maru “Sub-Zero” sashimi platter
Cooked: Zen Shrimp Bake with tempura tiger shrimp, spicy aioli, tobiko, scallions, and sweet eel sauce
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