Michi Sushi plays into the hands of people looking for a tasty and healthy meal on the run
Mia Stainsby
Sun
Kenneth Cho at Michi Sushi: Fast foods can be well-presented and healthy. Photograph by : Glenn Baglo, Vancouver Sun
MICHI SUSHI
1513 West Broadway
604-736-4244
www.michi-sushi.com
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As far as I’m concerned, the looks-aren’t-everything platitude doesn’t apply to food. The eyes get hungry, too.
After working as a bartender in glam restaurants like West, Lumiere and Chow, Kenneth Cho couldn’t help but have an eye for food. So when the young man (28 years old) decided to start a business, he went the route of fast-food sushi.
Michi Sushi (which means “street sushi” in Japanese) is right in the thick of pedestrian traffic at Broadway and Granville; it’s made to eat on the run. Michi sushi rolls aren’t cut into bite-sized pieces — they’re single rolls and you eat them like “burritos,” in Cho’s words, no chopsticks required. They’re displayed just-so in attractive trays and they’re not the same old, same old.
Of course, sushi is best made fresh, but if you’re more interested in speedy sushi, you can point and pay and run at Michi. I once went around closing time and truth to tell, the pre-made sushi (in a cooled display case) wasn’t at its best, albeit, discounted.
“Obviously Vancouverites love sushi but convenience foods can be well-presented and healthy,” says Cho, referring to the brown rice in about half the choices.
“Everyone’s been talking about the prawn and avocado sushi with lemon mayo,” says Cho, suggesting that might be a good one to try. Other Michi specials are the beef sukiyaki roll with marinated short-rib meat, enoki mushrooms and green onions; and wild sockeye salmon with cream cheese and cucumber. Vegans return for the marinated tofu with red pepper, cucumber and avocado roll and the marinated yam, shiitake mushroom, spinach and asparagus rolls. Sushi rolls are $3 to $3.50 or three for $9. There are 12 to choose from, as well as a sashimi salad of tuna and wild salmon with soy ginger vinaigrette. The soy sauce is packaged in mini plastic fish squirt bottles, the kind you’d see on Japan and Cathay Pacific airlines.
Cho says if business keeps up, he’d like to open more Michi Sushi outlets. This one is tiny, with three window seats and dressed in clean whites with a mirror wall and lime green floors.
“If Vancouver likes me, I’d love to open a few more and see people with Starbucks coffee in one hand and a Michi sushi roll in the other.”
Michi is open from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m., Monday to Saturday.
© The Vancouver Sun 2008
