One of the best Omakase I have ever had was Li Xiu sushi just off Dunhua South Road, but I think this one right here is even better value for money! Ready for some incredible sushi?
朋鰭TOMO is just north of Liuzhangli station in Taipei, right near Lingjiang Nightmarket. TOMO is an Omakase sushi restaurant. Omakase is a Japanese phrase that translates to “I leave it up to you” in English. I mean, how good is that simple translation? In the context of dining, it refers to a style of eating where the customer gives complete authority to the chef to select and serve a sequence of dishes that they deem appropriate. Sushi chefs use their expertise to create a personalized, multi-course menu based on the freshest ingredients available in that season. This means that Omakase sets regularly change, and often don’t have a menu.
Sushi is a culinary masterclass that tantalizes the taste buds with its delicate flavors and textures. Even before walking in to a sushi restaurant, I can barely contain my excitement. Its simplicity belies its complexity, as skilled chefs use precise techniques to sculpt bite-sized works of art that look almost too pretty to eat. From savory sashimi to umami-packed rolls, sushi‘s versatility and beauty make it a true feast for the senses. Get strapped in, everyone, as this is going to be a good one!
Table of Contents
The design is simple, and only by the outside will you be able to guess that this is a fancy Japanese place.
Inside, the restaurant is intimate and welcoming. It’s very authentically Japanese inside, meaning incredibly minimalist, whilst still feeling comfortable.
We went for lunch service, so it wasn’t as busy when we were there. Depending on what you’re looking for will depend on when you would look to go. But, remember that a dinner set is likely to be more expensive than a lunch set.
Maybe at dinner service I would entertain their carefully curated alcohol selection, but not for lunch.
I did also see some other customers drinking a frosty cold beer, which I was mighty tempted with.
The Omakase set at 朋鰭TOMO
Price list: Lunch set ranges from $1500, $2000, while the evening meal ranges from $2500, $3500.
You will need to book in advance by ringing 02-2732-6200 or 0933-567-976
We went for the $2000 lunch set.
Wasabi tofu 芥末豆腐
Wasabi tofu has a weird ring to it. But that’s the weird and wonderful life of Omakase – you genuinely never know what you’re going to get, but need to put absolute trust in the chef to prepare the best ingredients available to them at that moment. The tofu was delicately silky soft, with an almost soggy crunch to the outside of it, dabbed with soy sauce and dressed with wasabi. It was tasty as an appetizer.
Flounder 比目魚
I love flounder. It’s one of my regular orders at sushi restaurants, so when I see it being prepared in my omakase set, I am very happy. Prepared in a different way to what I am used to, this flounder was cut extremely thin. The contrast between the translucent flounder and the black plate add to the drama of this plate.
Cut so thin and then put on the plate with a small portion of the skirt, this flounder is then dabbed with some tiny shrimp eggs and topped with delicate green onions.
The flounder itself was chewy, yet tasty. I am not used to flounder being chewy, as oftentimes it is the skirt that is served and it is blow-torched to allow the fat to come out as the predominant flavour. However, this sashimi-style flounder was delicious due to the flavour and unusual texture. Would I order it a la carte? Maybe not, but I am glad I tried it.
Mackerel 鯖魚
Blow-torched to crispy-skinned perfection, this mackerel was succulent and juicy, popping with flavour in the mouth. I didn’t pair mine with wasabi because I think that more often than not wasabi can be overpowering. Even without the wasabi there was plenty of flavour with the brushed on soy sauce that 朋鰭TOMO put on almost every sushi offering here.
I really enjoy looking into the preparation box of a sushi chef. I could see some delicious Toro that I really wanted to get my face stuck into, so I was excited to see what this Omakase set still had to offer.
Then it happened, the toro came out and was looking beautiful. There’s something magical about the veins of fat running through the belly of a tuna that mesmerize me. There’s also something about watching a sushi chef with their long knife and deft touch that astounds me.
Cod sperm sac 鱈魚白子
Next up was the cod sperm sac. Wait, the what? That’s disgusting, how could you even eat that? Well, it happened, and it was delicious. No, I am not exaggerating, and I am not saying it was tasty just for the sake of saying it. It was seriously tasty!
It was served within a soy based sauce, topped with shrimp eggs and green onions, and the contrast of the pearl white against the dark bowl made it stand out.
In terms of flavour, there wasn’t a whole lot of flavour, this was more about the richness intertwined with the texture. The ‘skin’ of the dish was resistant and almost delicately rubbery, but when you popped that skin it burst into your mouth with this almost indescribable flavour of rich butteriness. It was so good that I would have taken another bowl of it had it been put in front of me. But, the sheer richness of the dish would have made having a second bowl a mistake. I implore you to enter Omakase with an open mind, as the chef really does know what they are doing.
Sushi prep time
Steamed egg 蒸蛋
The life of an sushi chef, especially that of an Omakase sushi chef must be really difficult and time consuming. They often break up the menu with a couple of cooked dishes in the middle of service. So here was the first of 2 hot dishes – steamed egg, before we got to some of the nigiri selections.
The texture of this steamed egg was super light and silky smooth. This could be drank with a straw quite easily. The juicy shrimp inside is welcomed, with a pop of salty sweet ocean flavour.
Fish cheek 魚下巴
I thought fish cheek would be all about the bone, and not actually offer up much meat, but once again my faith in the Omakase chef was justified. The amount of fat that had been retained on this made the entire chunk just melt in your mouth. It had been seasoned really well, and then grilled to perfection. This was one of the nicest dishes throughout the whole menu, in my opinion.
Tuna 鮪魚
The chu-Toro comes later, so this was a different cut of tuna that is more commonly seen in sushi restaurants and Omakase sets. This nigiri (remember that nigiri is fish on top, rice on the bottom, and served in a perfectly ratio’d amount that should be consumed in 1 single bite) was delicious, and a great starter for more to come. It didn’t blow me away, but it did raise my excitement levels, and was still better than most other nigiri I have had in Taiwan.
Needlefish 水針魚
The addition of the needlefish to the menu surprised me. I have never knowingly tried this before, but I will definitely look to order it again if I am ever (this will rarely happen) stuck with what to order in a sushi restaurant that isn’t Omakase style. Brushed with the house (soy) sauce, the freshness of the fish was left to be the star of the show, and it was really good.
Bream 芥末鯛
Delicate meat gave way to fragrance and depth of flavour throughout this mouthful. I continue to be impressed with the freshness of the fish on offer here at 朋鰭TOMO, and the complete confidence in this Omakase menu to allow the fish to do all of the talking and be the star of the show.
Yellowtail 白甘
The flavour here was moderately more rich than other nigiri offerings, but I was happy about that. This yellowtail was really good, slightly chewy (in a good way), yet retained the delicate texture that 朋鰭TOMO strike the balance of so well in their Omakase menu.
The skin on that fish really helps add to the flavour for me, too, as you don’t just eat with your mouth – we all eat with our eyes, too.
Tuna belly (Chu Toro) 鮪魚中腹
Oftentimes one of the most coveted parts of the tuna, the Chu-Toro went down an absolute treat, here. Carefully prepared and served simply nigiri style with just a delicate brush of the house (soy) sauce, as soon as you put this mouthful into your mouth, it coats your entire mouth with the incredible fat of the tuna. It melts on your tongue, coats your lips with delicious fat as it does so, and should hopefully spread a wonderful smile across your face.
I cannot talk about how good this was enough. It was one of the nicest things I have ever put in my mouth.
Scallop 干貝
Scallop is one of my favourite things to eat. And this was a mega-scallop that had clearly been working out! The succulence of the scallop was something to behold here, as it melted in my mouth to a clean ocean milk flavour with a slight charring on the top and bottom of the scallop itself offering up a different texture and a smoky flavour. Served simply inside a sheet of crunchy seaweed, this was a true triumph on this Omakase menu.
Sea urchin/Uni 海膽
As if life couldn’t get better after Chu-Toro and scallop eaten back to back, the chef cracked out the box of sea urchin/uni. If you’re a doubter because it looks like a weird sea tongue, then you really have to work to get past that, as once you pass through that mind barrier, you will realize just how delicious it can be! Addiction Aquatic Development in the north of the city is a good place to go to buy it and take it home to eat it in the safety of your own home, without the extra pressure of a sushi chef watching for your reaction.
Mind over matter can be an issue with first time sea urchin/uni eaters. But I implore you to give it a go. Once you get past the way it looks, your whole world will be opened up to an incredible depth of flavour that only sea urchin/uni can satiate. The texture is soft and silky smooth, the flavour is rich and buttery with a salty ocean flavour, and all balanced perfectly in harmony with one another.
Firefly squid 螢光烏賊
They arrived on the plate skewered in a 3. They were almost too pretty to eat. But, not wanting to ever waste food, I duly obliged and scoffed them down. I took these 1 by one, because I was a little apprehensive of the flavour and texture. They are way more delicate and soft when compared to their larger cousins. In flavour, they taste sweeter and have a much more intense flavour due to the flavour being condense into barely a whole mouthful per squid.
This was one of the big surprises for me, as I thought they tasted way nicer than I thought they were going to.
White shrimp 日本富山白蝦
I have used the word delicate so many times in this post, but this is yet another time when it is just completely appropriate. There are many different types of shrimp often used in sushi around Japan, and this white shrimp is popular due to the subtle flavour and texture. I really enjoyed this shrimp dish.
Tuna w/salmon roe 鮪魚泥拌鮭魚卵
The recently popular craze of Nakaochi sushi where customers use a spoon to scrape tuna off the fish has hit social media pretty hard with videos popping up all over the place. Here at 朋鰭TOMO, you’re not presented with the fish itself (thankfully, as I don’t really fancy doing that myself, to be honest), but the meat is scraped and forms an almost tuna-paste, on to which is added marinated salmon roe, all set atop a portion of beautiful sushi rice.
Delicious Omakase at its best. I really enjoyed these couple of spoonfuls of umami flavour.
Eel hand roll 鰻魚手卷
When I get eel, I expect it to be juicy, salty, sweet, and have that distinctive eel flavour. This had 3 of the 4 things I expect. What was it missing? It wasn’t juicy… This eel was crunchy, which caught me by surprise. It was a really refreshing spin on grilled eel that caught me off guard, but I enjoyed it a lot. The small amount of rice in there helps to balance out the fattiness of the eel, with a nice fragrance coming through from the dab of wasabi hiding in there.
Miso soup 味噌湯
The miso soup was delicious, with layer upon layer of great salty miso flavour broken apart by that silky tofu and green onion. I was happy to see some clams in there which help to sweeten it up that little bit more, too.
Tamagoyaki 玉子燒
Looking at this, it looks like cake. It’s not, it’s tamagoyaki – a layered egg dish that you can see more clearly below. But, this one was not the traditional type of tamagoyaki that I was used to, as the texture was completely different, and definitely a little cakey. It was good, but I wasn’t wild about it.
Panna cotta w/fruit 水果/黑糖奶酪
The panna cotta was delicious, as it had a lovely strong vanilla flavour that was balanced and brought out even more by the burnt caramel sauce on top. The fruit helped to finish the meal with a lovely cleanness.
The bottom line
But it’s so expensive, is it worth it? It’s expensive, you’re right. But if you are celebrating a special occasion, then I think it is absolutely worth it. It will impress both you and whomever you take with you, and you’ll leave full, with some amazing memories of some incredible Japanese food.
What was the best dish? It was between the scallop and Chu Toro for me. The fish cheek was also amazing, though.
What dish was a surprising hit? The cod sperm sack surprised me in many ways. It freaked me out, but I really enjoyed the texture and flavour a lot.