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Mr. Sushi
(513) 827-9345
580 Walnut St
Cincinnati, OH 45202

By the time we met up with our friend after work and got downtown it was going on eight o’clock. I don’t know if that’s early or late by weeknight downtown standards but we found Mr. Sushi at light capacity, with only a few tables of hipsters at the front making a ruckus. We’d heard that the service was slow but were surprised that both our appetizer of vegetable tempura and our combo plate of sushi came out quickly. Maybe it was the right time of day or that our sushi didn’t require any special handling like an exotic dead-fish roll.

The tempura veggies were a little pricey at $5 and there wasn’t as much as I would’ve expected but what we got was a tasty mix of deep fried peppers, onion, carrot and zucchini. Pretty typical stuff but good. The Vegetable Roll Combination on their web menu is a little different than what we had. Ours was an AAC (Avocado, Asparagus, Cucumber) roll, a Vegetable (Carrot, Avocado, Cucumber) roll and Inari for $13. Both are pretty typical rolls but Mr. Sushi’s had a sweeter flavor that I think of fondly as I type this and the Inari, of course, were scrumptious; a little small but well packed with tasty rice, nice and cold.

The only downside, really, is that Mr. Sushi is downtown but for the crowd who live, work, and play down there on a daily basis it’s well worth stopping in. They’re maybe a little pricier than some of the nearby alternatives but not by much!

Fusion Wok Sushi Bar Front

Fusion Wok Sushi Bar
(513) 898-1633
3645 Stone Creek Blvd, Suite H
Cincinnati, OH 45251

Katy: We went to check out the new sushi place in the Stone Creek shopping center on Colerain south of I-275 for dinner Sunday night. We were excited that there would be an alternative to Kabuto in the area.

Fusion Wok Sushi Bar decor

Shawn: Kabuto is a pretty miserable stop for sushi so, like Katy said, we were thrilled to see a new place opening up. Located in the fancy-pants area of Northgate, Fusion Wok is a small restaurant, not much bigger than University Heights’ Maki Express, with similarly spartan decoration. The furnishings are nice and new with lacquered dark wood and the sushi bar is as colorful and lively as any but overall it’s a typical sushi joint.

So that leaves us with the food. A complimentary dish of sugared peanuts surprised us both but I passed on account of them being nuts and all. After a few questions with one of the chefs to confirm what was vegan we had ordered veggie roll ($3.25), sweet potato roll ($4.25),  avocado roll ($2.95), cucumber roll ($2.50) and some inari ($3.50).

Fusion Wok Sushi Bar sushi

Katy: The presentation of the sushi was very nice and we were thrilled to see the sweet potato roll is tempura sweet potato like we’ve had at Tokyo. The inari had a very small amount of rice and the tofu wrapper was folded up into itself making these the smallest we’ve had at this price.  The veggie roll had a miso sauce on top that was a little sweet & spicy (very slight) and very tasty.  Nothing thrilling to say about the avocado or cucumber rolls, they were tasty, not bad and not amazing – average priced.  In total, I think all the rolls were reasonably priced for size & quality except the inari being skimpy.

We are looking forward to going again within the next week to try non-sushi foods.  Shawn uploaded their menu to Urban Spoon, but as of this moment it hasn’t shown up yet.

Here are the rest of the photos we took

complimentary treat	veggie & avocado rolls
cucumber & sweet potato	complimentary treat
soy sauce

Thai Namtip
5461 North Bend Road
Cincinnati, OH 45247-7620
(513) 481-3360

We came up with the idea to review all the veggie sushi options in the tri-state area, but we are off to a slow start.  (Anyone want to do guest posts?)  We don’t always want to eat sushi, so this will be an ongoing thing…yeah…oh and Shawn came up with “Cincy Sushi Survey”.  We should probably buy that url. It’s pretty awesome

Ok first sushi survey is Thai Namtip in the White Oak area!  They have at least six vegetarian meals to choose from (that may actually be vegan, ask first) and 4 veg sushi.
Asparagus Roll Asparagus, rice, sesame wrapped in seaweed.   $4.95
Avocado Roll Avocado, rice, sesame wrapped in seaweed.   $4.95
Cucumber Roll Cucumber, rice, sesame wrapped in seaweed.   $4.95
AACC Roll Asparagus, avocado, cucumber, carrot, rice wrapped in seaweed.   $5.95

Shawn: Whenever we go to Thai Namtip I prefer to stick with my all-time favorite dish — Tofu Ramrong — but for the sake of this exhaustive study I put my own selfish yearnings aside and ate some sushi.  Thai Namtip’s sushi is a nice, plump one-bit mouthful and they don’t skimp on the number of rolls per order. I always appreciate an AACC roll but any place that offers a simple asparagus roll on its own gets a nod in my book. The prices are right around average for most places in town and with a huge menu of other dishes to fall back on, Thai Namtip has an early lead in our little survey.