Ichiumi is not your grandfather’s all-you-can-eat-buffet. The smorgasbord-style spots of yesteryear schemed to fill diners with inexpensive fodder. The likes of potato and macaroni salad came in huge bowls while a scant supply of shrimp was offered on a tiny plate. That often resulted in inexpensive food sitting around forever while more desirable morsels were instantly snapped up.
Instead, Ichiumi, the Japanese Seafood Buffet Restaurant in Manhattan, is a slick, spacious, sophisticated, big city beauty with what seems like a mile-long buffet table loaded with sushi and sashimi, hot and cold entrees, salads and desserts. A small army of chefs churns out over 30 varieties of freshly made sushi and sashimi. Patrons can order customized hand rolls, crepes, udon noodle soup, grilled beef, chicken or vegetables.
You get the idea. Ichiumi is no mass production get ’em in, get ’em out kind of place. And because its table is so long, there’s no need to stand in line. Diners just hop around. Add modern, minimalist décor, (fresh flowers, rice paper dividers, cherry blossoms lining the entrance way, shiny laminated tables, lighted shadow boxes holding tiny, brightly colored glass vases) and caring, charming Japanese servers and you have the super bowl of all-you-can-eat emporiums.
Aside from the wonderfully bewildering array of sushi and sashimi, the spread at Ichiumi yields shrimp (four or five ways), salmon (also four or five ways), tempuras, teriyakis, lobster tails, prime ribs, barbecued ribs, scallops, crab cakes, pork loin, etc. Fruit, ice cream, cream puffs and appropriately small squares of artfully arranged cheese, blueberry, chocolate, strawberry, kiwi and orange cakes are all available on an unlimited basis at dessert time.
Prices for this feast are modest by Manhattan standards: weekday lunches $13.95, dinners $23.95, weekend lunches $15.95, with dinners $25.95. The authenticity of Ichiumi's Japanese fare is attested to by the large number of Asian diners drawn to its 32nd Street site.
Few diners will have the ability to sample every sushi. The ones I thought outstanding were the spicy temaki sushi like the tuna and salmon and the soft shell crab, broiled shrimp, red snapper and halibut. For the fainthearted there’s the cooked California roll, an avocado and crab combination.
Although the entrée emphasis is appropriately on seafood at Ichiumi, don’t completely neglect meat selections like the fall-away-from-the-bone, marinated pork barbecue ribs or the rare, tender slivers of prime beef.
If you still have room, don’t forget the dessert table along with all those delectable little cakes.
But don’t pass up Ichiumi. It’s a real find.
6 E. 32nd St. btw. Fifth & Madison Aves., 212-725-1333
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