Shuko is like a portal to Japan right in Union Square. The entire ambiance is made for elegance and calm and to take care of you. One of my favorite parts of going to an incredible meal is that everything inside the restaurant is built to take care of you. You don’t really get that anywhere in your day-to-day life. When you’re in the restaurant, you are the restaurant’s primary concern. You finish a glass of sake, that sake glass is gone and they are refilling. And you know Shuko is going to have hand lotion in the bathroom (and Aesop at that!).
However, sometimes being so watched after can feel like you can’t f*ck up. We tested this. Inadvertently. When we were starting the omakase part of the meal, the sushi chef served us fresh, pickled ginger. We missed what he said, so we didn’t really know what it was, and thought it might have been the first piece of fish. So, I coyly asked our waiter, “umm do we eat everything with our hands?” and he answered in the affirmative, and then added that eating sushi with your fingers is gentler on the fish and preserves the chef’s creation. Lastly, (and here’s the skill), explained that the ginger we had on our plates was to cleanse our palates between the sushi, and that was made in-house, which made it a little sweeter. Voila – read you loud and clear. Ginger. Not fish.
With all of that said, what I’m trying to say is that at Shuko, they’ll take care of you even if you can’t tell the difference between ginger or fish.
