Oishi Restaurant

Yes, we've been dining out a lot lately. It seems that since the snow has stopped, everyone has come back to life and our social calendar is filling up again. But, when we're introduced to fantastic little places like Oishi, it becomes apparent how wonderful evenings dining out with friends are.

Bryan & Emily suggested we all go for sushi, and Oishi is a place that they've discovered in Newtown. It's incredibly popular with the locals, and even with a reservation we had to wait twenty minutes or so for a table. Service is prompt and friendly, and there's no sense of urgency once you're seated, which is good.

It's a BYOB place (many restaurants in PA are, because of the strict liquor laws), and it's the first time that Jonathan and I actually did bring in our own wine. We had picked up some Fu-Ki Plum Wine at one of our local liquor stores, and it was delicious. We also have tried the cherry flavor... I don't care for it but Jonathan does.

We started off with the Tartar Tuna, since that's a dish we liked a lot in Cali. But, it was very different here, and I'm not at all convinced it was worth $10 (aside from the very generous serving of caviar on top). It wasn't blended like tartars in Cali were... instead it was arranged in a little cylindrical tower with mango. It was okay, I wouldn't get it again. The photo is impressive. Bryan and Emily had some edamame, which was served warm and salted here, unlike at Mirim. Jonathan liked it, too.
The entrees came with soup or salad, and I was the only one who went with the salad. And that was the wrong choice, LoL. The dressing was heavy and hard to define. I'm still not quite sure what it was, but I know I'd never get it again (which is odd for me to say... rarely do I meet a dressing that peculiar). Everyone else thought the soup was very good, a miso-mushroom mix.

They went for the sweet potato roll, Jonathan and I had a salmon roll. The sweet potato roll has tempura inside, which was new. Jonathan tried it, I passed. Rave reviews. The salmon roll was very fresh and quite delicious.

Jonathan had Thai Green Curry, which was a variety that I had never seen before. They use different peppers to make it green, apparently. He thought it was bland, and didn't seem to enjoy it as much as he might if it was red curry. Bryan went with a bento box-type meal, and seemed to enjoy it all very much. I really liked the shape of the dish, it was large with three domes dug out for the items, neat!

Emily had a sushi platter, and I went with Chirashi (fish on top of a pile of rice, as opposed to each piece of fish on a little pad of rice). It was my first time having octopus, but the rest were all fish I knew. Octopus tastes exactly like you might expect... chewy like calamari, and there are some sucker-like pieces on it. The white tuna was divine. I'm talking like top 3 white tunas I've ever had. The whitefish was also delectable, and that's coming from a person who generally giver her whitefish to her husband, LoL. I thought that the salmon was average (three pieces of regular and three pieces with WAY too much roe), and so was the tuna. Emily had many of the same fish (no octopus tho, she had clam instead, which she was was very chewy), and also a California roll (with crab, FL folks).

If/when we go back, I'd probably get a more specialized dish (chirashi is very generic, in my opinion), and certainly the soup instead of the salad. Actually, they have a lot of noodle dishes, so I kinda wanna go back to get a feel for their non-raw stuff, LoL.