This is, perhaps, a strange category for this fish-laden Austin Sushi News report, but, especially in this age of over-fishing and mercury contamination, there is a place for our vegan brethren. And, I must say that, it's pretty hard to find high-quality vegan food in Austin. Sure, I dig Casa De Luz and Veggie Heaven on occasion, but the recently opened Daily Juice Cafe at 45th and Duval has an amazing vegan sushi roll on their menu called the Daily Sushi. The roll consists of "pumpkinseed pesto, coconut strips, shredded carrots, avocado, red bell pepper, and sprouts rolled in a crisp nori sheet and served with ginger-wasabi dipping sauce." Now that's good eatin' !

Bad economic times never seem to stop the flow of sushi into our faces, and, notwithstanding the proportions of this economic bust, some new sushi is on its way.

The AustinSushi.com team took a stroll over to Maki, the latest spin on "fast" Japanese food, and was mightily impressed by this new Austin operation. They are, essentially, a roll-your-own sushi roll bar where you walk up to a counter, point at the ingredients you want, and the person behind the counter (not a sushi chef) makes the requested roll. In order to speed up the delivery time and lower employee costs, they utilize a sushi robot, specifically the Audio-Technica ASM 860, that spreads the rice onto the nori. This allows for relatively unskilled labor to complete the roll.
The place has a noveau fresh ambiance with a pleasant lime green color and spiffy graphics on the wall. It's definitely "fast" food and not a sushi bar, but still a great place to get a sushi fix when you need something fast that's well-prepared.

The notorious DK has apparently revved-up his sushi making machine, and is offering classes on a weekly basis (every thursday and saturday) at very affordable prices.

Meanwhile, Andrew "Kiniakua" Grambusch is now offering catering and classes as "Sushi Anyone?". From the looks of his photos, he has some chops.

Husband and wife team, Take and Kayo, owners of delibento.com, also offer sushi catering and classes. Check out their "Little Rollers" class for kids!

If you're one of those folks who bicycles to Wheatsville with your own canvas bags, and you're wondering how to lower your environmental footprint at the sushi bar (aren't we all? :-), then look no further. The overused and ill-defined word "green" got another boost in a recent Washington Post article which points to consumer groups that are offering seafood guides to help sushi patrons make the wisest sushi choices. The guides suggest that "it’s time to say sayonara to toro (aka bluefin tuna). Hamachi (yellowtail)....And ... freshwater eel and avocado rolls -- unagi is also a big environmental no-no." These guides will help you decide which seafood species are in various stages of danger. The three guides, from the Environmental Defense Fund, Blue Ocean Institute and the Monterey Bay Aquarium, are available as handy links (to PDF files) here:
EDF Sushi Selector
Blue Ocean Guide
Monterey Bay Guide

According to lead developer Masahiko Noguchi, sushitrainer.com took five years to complete, and the new online sushi chef training site had three top Los Angeles-based sushi chefs involved from start to finish. For a mere $10 monthly tuition fee, the site offers you over 170 different classes (totalling some 7,000 web pages). They unofficially launched on September 1st, and, by the way, anyone can take their online classes -- not just sushi chefs. Here's the quick bullet-point list:

• Online real-time interactive video instruction
• 3-Way rotating instruction center for multimedia E-learning
• Downloadable Lessons, recipies, nutritional data in PDF format
• Over 300 Videos and over 10,000 photos
• Professional instruction from beginning to advanced sushi training.
• Online Note taking system
• Message board
• User administration center
• Study at your own pace
• Quick phone and email support
• Resource and Links on how to obtain tools and sushi equipment

The AustinSushi team trekked back to Imperia for an all-out sushifest featuring some amazing creations from head chef Tatsu Aikawa and just enough sake to to keep things chill. Imperia is positioning itself as a downtown sushi player to be reckoned with despite being only blocks from Kenichi, Maiko, Kyoto, and Silhouette.

The Austin American-Statesman reports that Uchi will expand with a second sushi bar in an, as yet, unamed "North Central" Austin location, "perhaps within months."

Uchi's head chef, Tyson Cole, is also opening a third restaurant as well. It appears to be the prophesized sushi restaurant inside the new "W" Hotel rising up just North of City Hall. The new restaurant inside the "W" will be named "Canteen" and will feaure Japanese and Spanish cuisine.

Our intrepid Austin Sushi News reporter, CuddleFish, alerted us to a New York Times story about two teenagers testing sushi at sushi bars in New York City. They discovered that a full 25% of sushi served to them (from tobiko to tuna) did not match the DNA of the seafood listed on the menu. No word on which sushi bars were guilty of the bait and switch, but hopefully a portable version of this DNA fingerprinting will become available (the pair had to send their sushi samples to a lab for testing).

Austin Sushi News reported on a similar scam (the reviewer used their finely tuned palate instead of laboratory testing) in the December, 2001 edition of Austin Sushi News

The former Origami Express at 2438 West Anderson Lane (the North side of Anderson Lane) has changed hands and is now Sushi Kyu (this web site does not seem to be responding). It's main claim to fame is their set of sushi robots that automate various sushi bar tasks including sushi rolling (see video above). The robot in the video is the Suzumo model SVR-BRX ($18,000 U.S.). It rolls sushi but does not perform all the steps necessary for more complex rolls. Still, Sushi Kyu's owner says that the machine replaces roughly one sushi chef at a reasonable cost (he's a regional distributor for the Suzumo line of automated sushi machines, by the way).