Taste Test: Under-the-radar sushi with flair near Dupont Circle
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Chef Sonny Lee with torched salmon (left) and hand rolls. Photo: Anna Spiegel/Axios
A new sushi spot is flying under the radar near Dupont Circle — but given the generous lunch specials and dramatic flair (cue flaming nigiri) it won't be overlooked for long.
Why it matters: Umai Nori is a rare temaki (hand roll) restaurant that hits a creative sweet spot between the city's pricey omakase counters and standard sushi dens.
Dig in: Chef and co-owner Sonny Lee knows his way around a whole fish — we caught him butchering behind the bar — thanks to a lifelong career as a sushi chef.
- Lee moved to the United States to open Yuraku restaurant in NYC with his dad in the '80s and ran a spinoff in Germantown, Maryland, for two decades.
The vibe: A sleek hidden gem, tucked off 20th and M streets. There are 40-odd seats between the white marble sushi counter backlit in neon violet (the best perch to catch the action) and tables across two levels.
- We visited during lunch and even then, the place felt lively thanks to Lee serving heaping hand rolls across the counter and searing fish with a hand torch while customers dug in.
Best bites: Lunch specials that could easily serve two (a good plan if you want to try more à la carte dishes). We indulged in the sashimi teishoku meal set.
- At $29 it's pricier than the bentos and roll combos. But it felt like a bargain feast given the quality of the sashimi — prime cuts of tuna, toro, yellowtail, and salmon — and bounty of accompaniments like dumpling soup, rice, pickles, a crispy hand roll, and crackling basket of shrimp-and-vegetable tempura.
What to try: Creative temaki.
- The taco-size hand rolls are a bit unwieldy — maybe skip if you're on a first date — but they're packed with fun flavors and textures like torched salmon with guacamole and coconut flakes or hamachi crudo with shiso, scallion, and beet chips.
The intrigue: The menu is big — seven pages of apps, samplers, robata, and rolls.
- Admittedly, we just grazed the surface. I want to try the sushi or sashimi samplers that have D.C. TikTokers raving.
Go: Umai Nori, 1147 20th St NW. Open for lunch and dinner, closed Sunday (Note: On summer break until Aug. 19).