Sushi Mido
(By the way, I go off on a tanget for a bit. If you’re just here for the review, go down to the break!)
I was in the mood for Dim Sum this morning…but I had one obstacle standing in my way: BWD, Jr. Ever the Chinese buffet connoisseur, BWD, Jr. wanted to get Chinese from a buffet and I wanted to go some place real. So, we decided to go to the all-you-can-eat sushi place instead. (Yeah, I don’t get it either.)
But … All You Can Eat Sushi???
Yes, all-you-can-eat sushi. I know what you’re thinking. When you’re paying $17.95 for all the sushi you can possibly stuff down your gullet (did I mention they’re learning to fear me there?), the first thing people think is: wow, the ingredients must suck. You, know, that’s not an unreasonable thought.
Anytime you go to an all-you-can-eat anything, you can feel assured you’re sacrificing quality over what you would get in a by-the-plate restaurant. However, in an all-you-can-eat sushi restaurant, you have a leg up over most other buffets because the sushi is hand rolled. So whereas that vat of beef with broccoli sitting in a steam tray has likely been given all the care shown to the garbage as its tossed in the dumpster (note: I don’t know if that’s true. I am sure there are some places that really put effort into their buffet offerings, but I think about 99% of “Chinese” food was is made is a Cisco lab somewhere), the sushi you get at an all-you-can-eat place has been hand crafted.
Plus, Sushi Mido is pretty smart about how they do their all-you-can-eat. First, you can only get rolls, which are full of rice and more filling than individual nigiri or sashimi and, while I haven’t done an extensive survey, the ingredients that form the rolls are pretty limited: crab, fried shrimp, cream cheese, cucumber, etc. So, my assumption is that Sushi Mido buys a lot of stuff in bulk.
All of which leads up to something I figured out today
If You Turn Your Nose Up at All You Can Eat Sushi and Order Rolls Anywhere Else You Obviously Like Overpaying for Fish*
Well, at least you live in the Midwest.
Really, this insight hit me when the first artful plate of sushi arrived at my table. Looking at the rolls they present, they’re essentially the exact same rolls you get at any other sushi place, even the really fancy ones like Ra or Nara, where hip KC-ers go for sushi. Let’s face it, in the middle of the country, there are only so many outlets for sushi-grade fish. Plus, once it finds its way into any roll, whether it’s a fancy lollipop thingy at Ra or the Midnight Fantasy roll at Sushi Mido, it’s still a sushi roll. At that point, you should be judging the individual roll, not the style of restaurant.
Okay, so all tangets aside, let’s get back to why we’re here.