Osaka

Sushi Hijiri

Name: Dinner @ Sushi Hijiri on August 26, 2024
Start: 2024-08-26
Location: Sushi Hijiri

鮨ひじり

Breaking the traditional standard, a team of three young chefs have come together with a vision to offer the best sushi they can create together. Leveraging their experiences as well as their differences, Sushi Hijiri is a collaboration of craftsmanship and ideas, allowing them to evolve the traditional cuisine and offer a fresh experience for sushi lovers.

Sushi Hijiri is located in Fukushima, a charming Osaka neighborhood made up of old and new architecture. Marked with a simple wooden sign on white stone walls, the restaurant is a little modern spot hidden along rows of traditional Japanese houses.

Since opening in 2023, the restaurant has quickly attracted dedicated fans, lured by the chefs’ talent. The owner, Shoma Hayashi, is a Fukushima local whose family ran a Osaka-sushi bar in the neighborhood. Rikiya Hama and Nijiho Takai, now husband and wife, both trained at a branch of Sushi Saeki, one of the top sushi establishments in Japan.

While most independent sushi restaurants in Japan are run by a single owner, the three chefs decided to collaborate to offer a unique experience. They can procure better fish using their wider network of suppliers. They can also rely on each other for ideas and feedback. The sushi rice recipe has been revised and improved multiple times over.

Breaking the traditional standard

Made up of six dishes and a dozen pieces of sushi, the omakase menu is curated by all three chefs. Their collective network allows them to procure fresh catches from top vendors, including top-grade tuna from the Yamayuki Group.

Steamed abalone is tender and juicy, draped in lightly thickened kuzu sauce made with aromatic dashi broth. Nodoguro is grilled to perfection and served with a bright yellow corn sauce. The fat of the fish and the sweetness of the corn go together so well.
Yakishimo of conger eel is a gorgeous dish with the lightly charred skin melding beautifully with the sweetness of the raw fish. Enjoy with Tosa vinegar sauce mixed with ume plum meat.

The torotaku roll, made of mashed marbled fatty tuna and pickled radish, is served early in the evening so guests can enjoy its amazing flavor while still a little hungry.
Otoro tuna has the perfect amount of fat that it’s sweet and tender but never greasy. The meat is buttery and soft as it melts away in your mouth. Sushi rice is made using a secret recipe that uses all kinds of flavors including red vinegar, apple vinegar and rice vinegar.

Sea urchin gunkan maki is rich in flavor with a batch sent from Hokkaido. Wrapped around in crisp seaweed, the sushi brings you flavors of the ocean.

INGREDIENTS
Over the years of working at the local fish market, Hayashi has built great relationships with Osaka’s top vendors. Hama and Takai also have their own networks from the time they worked at Sushi Saeki. By working as a team, they are able to choose from a wider range of suppliers to source the best seasonal catches.

The tuna is procured from Yamayuki Group, one of the top vendors in the market. Conger eel comes from key ports such as Awaji, Tokushima and at times South Korea. To complement the fish, they stock a selected collection of sake such as Juyondai, Jikon, Denshu, as well as champagne and French wines.

CHEF

Shoma Hayashi

Shoma Hayashi was born in Osaka in 1990 as the son of a local sushi chef. He grew up eating oshi-sushi and inari for breakfast, and fish broth ara soup for dinner. He looked up to his father and knew from a young age that he wanted to become a sushi chef himself.

Once in high school, he started working at the fish market and began his apprenticeship at a sushi restaurant in Kita-Shinchi. He was later invited to join a sushi restaurant in Germany where he also worked as a private chef. It was during these years that he internalized the way of omotenashi, or Japanese hospitality.

After returning to Japan, he met Rikiya Hama and Nijiho Takai. The two young chefs were both working at Rousen Saeki, a branch of renowned Sushi Saeki, and had ambitions to eventually own their own restaurant. In 2023, the three teamed up to open Sushi Hijiri. “What keeps me going is when the guests tell me how delicious our sushi is,” he said.

Rikiya Hama was born in Oita on the island of Kyushu in 1992. His father was a former sumo wrestler and ran a chanko nabe restaurant. Growing up, he loved food and became interested in the world of sushi. After finishing culinary school, his skills won him a spot at Sushi Saeki where he worked at a number of their branches, and also met his wife Takai. Since opening Sushi Hiriji, his dream is to make the restaurant a success, and expand their reach to outside Japan.

Nijiho Takai was born in Osaka in 1998. Raised by a mother who loved to cook, she naturally chose to pursue a culinary career. She worked at sushi restaurants in Osaka and South Korea before joining Rousen Saeki where she met Hama. Now that she’s a mother, she appreciates that she has a team to run a restaurant with. “Sushi allows me to express myself,” she said. “I love watching the guests enjoy our sushi right in front of us.”

VISION
The team at Sushi Hijiri is committed to evolving the traditional cuisine of sushi through collaboration. “It’s our strength that we can provide three different styles of sushi. Each one of us can play to our strength and offer the best overall experience,” Hama says.

“Sushi Hijiri is just our starting point,” Hayashi says. “Eventually, we would love to expand abroad but our priority is here and now.”

TUNA

Sushi Hijiri sources all their tuna from Yamayuki Group, one of the top vendors in Toyosu fish market. Sweet, aromatic and consistent in texture, the premium fish gets delivered to the restaurant once a week. Each cut is prepared and stored in different ways with some served immediately while others are matured to deepen the flavor.