We miss Ichi Sushi and husband-wife owners Tim and Erin Archuleta, who ran the cozy Outer Mission/Bernal Heights restaurant from 2006 until its pandemic-forced closure in 2020. But some spaces — blessedly — get into the right hands.
Palo Alto born-and-raised chef Erik Aplin and team opened Chīsai Sushi Club on September 7, 2021, in Ichi’s original, tiny space. Aplin worked at Ichi alongside Tim Archuleta as chef de cuisine until 2015, and at other notable SF sushi restaurants, Akiko’s and Robin, plus Morimoto Napa and Matsuhisa Vail.
San Francisco is rife with Michelin-starred and Tokyo-esque (edomae-style) sushi bars, from the elegant (just awarded its first Michelin star) The Shota, to the Tokyo-subway-station-reminiscent Oma San Francisco Station. Chīsai is not exactly that kind of place, yet it’s a fresh example of the vibrant sushi range in this town — an affordable omakase compared to many, with “The Chīsai” 13-course tasting menu at $80, “The Oki” 17-course at $110 and “The Yasai” 12-course vegetarian for $65. Chisai’s sushi bar is just eight seats, plus another 14 seats in the dining room, so reservations are wise.
Not unlike the aforementioned (but totally different) Robin, which is the rock star/hip hop sushi experience that still pays homage to classic nigiri and technique, cozy Chīsai manages a less-chic but similar youthful casualness with a traditional spirit. This is exemplified by more common temaki (sushi handrolls) alongside playful renditions inspired by a BLT or lox.
Me and my pal, Mary, were the perfect example of how Chīsai can swing both ways. Me? A sushi fanatic who has not only visited every Michelin-starred sushi (and every single Michelin-starred restaurant. Period.) in SF and environs, but dined at hundreds of neighborhood and star-less sushi spots well worth visiting. I’ve also traveled my beloved Japan, eaten at numerous edomae sushi greats there, toured Tokyo’s original Tsukiji Fish Market with our own sushi master Ken Tominaga (of Rohnert Park great Hana and SF’s Pabu), and while I crave a good maki (roll), I’ve grown to prefer and judge a sushi bar’s quality by its nigiri.
My brilliant and spiritual soul sister Mary is not in the food “industry” and has never been a big “fish person” beyond ubiquitous (and overfished) tuna and salmon. She loves old-time favorites of mine like the Inner Richmond’s Sushi Bistro but sticks mostly to rolls/maki — and veers towards the tempura-ed, cooked fish rolls I avoid.
No judgment here: there is a sweet place for “Americanized” sushi. But the more I tasted of silky, pitch-perfect nigiri over the years — or amazing Hokkaido and California uni side-by-side — the more I couldn’t go back. I emphasize our varying palates and sushi experience level to say: Chīsai appealed to us both. And the warm team immediately put us at ease.
Once we settled in with a glass of sparkling wine, then Oakland great Den Sake Brewery’s silky, layered Batch 14 sake, we were served our first rounds of delicate crab salad and sashimi — on our recent visit, this was British Columbia albacore in miso, ponzu, shimeji mushrooms with a fascinating, balanced hit of Sichuan pepper. Mary had not yet informed me of her sushi preferences, but our appetites were properly whetted to dig into nine pieces of nigiri (sashimi/fish over rice).
We were off: fluke from Korea in sea salt and finger lime; bluefin tuna dotted with ponzu from Baja, Mexico, and shima aji (Japanese striped jack), intriguingly touched with lively Indian pickle, made up our first nigiri trio.
This is when Mary dropped some truth. She admitted she normally didn’t eat this range of fish — or nigiri in general. She marveled at the rice quality with its hint of vinegar, the nigiri’s proper one-bite size, no-soy-sauce-needed (beyond chef’s touch), and ultimately, the silky freshness of the fish. She said she normally wouldn’t order this and was loving each piece.
We moved on to Japanese medai (blue nose fish) — a favorite taste all night for us both with its subtle but memorable pop of shiso, lemon and licorice sea salt. Then Ōra King salmon from New Zealand in nori (seaweed) butter, followed by kanpachi (amberjack) from Hawaii in lemon, lemon salt and makrut lime zest. I commented how only one fish thus far was from Japan, whereas at many Michelin-starred sushi restaurants, the majority is from Japan — and comes with the price tag to match. I’ve gotten familiar with fish sources over the past 20 years. In many cases, what I saw here on the changing menu are “secondary” sushi sources, known for quality and better prices than ever-in-demand Japanese fish.
Time for another sake: Mantensei “Star-filled Sky” Junmai Ginjo delivers delicate umami, mushroom notes, thanks to three years of tank aging, with a dry, clean, mineral finish. The sake evokes the umami-funk I love so, but with a lighter body.
Our last nigiri trio moved from a less-oily-than-usual saba mackerel from Norway, dotted with sweet mustard and dill, to Scottish umi masu (one of my sustainable faves: salmon-esque ocean trout) in yuzu kosho and lemon, and, finally, seared black cod from Canada in yuzu miso and shoyu. Here we learned of chef Aplin’s Norwegian and Japanese heritage, as that mustard and dill hit on the mackerel hinted at. It had me wondering where else he could go. With my Scandinavian travels and food love, I’ve long seen the merely hinted-at potential between Scandinavia’s cured and pickled fishes and sushi.
Aplin’s playfulness comes out in aforementioned temaki, served in an open nori wrap in custom wooden holders (you get one with the standard omakase, but I’d recommend adding on a non-traditional handroll). I was at home with the seafood tower temaki: scallop, Santa Barbara uni, ikura fish roe and nori butter. But I was utterly charmed by the BLTA filled with bacon, lettuce, tomato, avocado and yuzu kosho mayo — and ready to return for the “deli-style” temaki featuring Goldie Lox vegan carrot lox made by Julie Podair, a woman in the neighborhood, dotted with cucumber, avocado, red onions and capers.
One of my longtime Japanese desserts, taiyaki—which I usually get at Kissako Tea in Japantown Mall — arrived to finish, a little, fish-shaped pancake/waffle shaped, filled with Nutella over housemade huckleberry ice cream. Future seasonal flavor combos are endless (they previously made hōjicha tea ice cream).
Mary tasted sea urchin for the first time — an acquired taste I used to hate over 15 years ago, but eventually fell so hard for, it became one of my favorite foods of all time (and believe me, I love thousands). I caught the surprise, the glint in her eye as she realized she might like it. While she preferred the more subtle Den Sake, aged sake’s layered umami notes were a revelation for her, just as they were for me years back.
Lest I sound like a doting mother proud my friend tried all the things, rather, as she expressed her delight in each bite, I felt renewed in the wonder of taste, the ecstasy food and drink can be. It is one of the most embodied, everyday expressions we have of adventure, open-mindedness, reaching beyond our safety and limits into new territory — and all through something that is daily ritual and necessity. Through pushing our own palates, even a bit, we can learn about and fall in love with other cultures and the traditions that root them. We can deepen our pleasure and witness our own expansive possibility.
This is what food and drink have done for me and for so many of my kindreds the world over. As I watched my well-read, intuitive friend join me with the same openness with which she teaches and lives life, we entered that portal to a more vast (and delicious) world. All thanks to a humble neighborhood sushi newcomer.
// 3369 Mission Street; https://chisaisushiclub.com
