Lunch at Sushi 29 a Real Treat

When I realized that the next restaurant lunching down Solano was another sushi place, I thought it was a bit strange that two Japanese restaurants would be so close together. (Just three doors down on the same side of the street is Miyuki, which I reviewed last week.) But they're really different, so maybe it's not that strange.

Giant cheerful daisies greet you on the walls of Sushi 29.  (Which match the menus!) I wondered what the name referred to—Sushi 29. Dave surmised that the first 28 sushi places they opened up failed. But our waitperson explained that it's actually 2, 9 (not twenty-nine), which in texting lingo is "tonight." I never would have guessed that, but then I'm a middle-aged woman who refuses even to shorten words when she texts, let alone substitute numbers for letters, so perhaps I'm not the demographic they were thinking of...

It was cold and rainy that day, so being served hot tea immediately was quite welcome as was the yummy miso soup. Both my lunch companions ordered the chef's choice plate because they are adventurous eaters and love sushi. Unlike me. If I weren't on a mission to eat at every lunch spot on Solano, I never even would have entered a place with sushi as part of the name.

But there was plenty that was not sushi on the menu for me. I got the teriyaki salmon don, which was wonderful. Entrées aren't cheap, but shelling out an extra $3 for eight adorable and delicious gyoza makes it a better deal. And George proclaimed them the best potstickers he'd ever tasted. And I'm happy to report that I was not served one of those pointless obligatory salads that are never any good anyway. That's definitely a point in their favor. Another bonus was the refreshing slice of cucumber in nice tall glasses of ice water that got refilled without having to hunt down someone.

Because I don't do sushi, you're going to have to trust Dave and George when they say the sashimi was very good and several steps above the last sushi place we visited. To me it was still just various lumps of cold, raw seafood with some seaweed thrown in, though even I have to admit that the fresh flowers and slivers of ginger coaxed into roses made for a lovely presentation.

Dave reports that the bathroom was dark but assured me it was clean. I still don't understand why restaurants would design restrooms to be purposely dark unless it was their plan not to clean them very well, but maybe I'm just overly suspicious...

Interesting side note: the sushi chef was wearing a Bluetooth. I thought it was so he could talk on the phone while working. Dave suggested that he probably wasn't grooving on the pop music that was playing in the dining room and was piping in his own soundtrack that fit his particular rhythm of fish chopping.

Sushi 29 is another restaurant that does not accept Solano Avenue Association cards. If I had limited my tour to eating establishments that do take them, I probably would have finished by now.

All in all, a lovely, if rather expensive, lunch. But I guess you get what you pay for. I would say it's a good spot for special occasions. (Or people with more disposable income than me.)