STM’s restaurant review: Rainbow sushi reigns supreme at Sumeshiya Japanese in Manning

What do you get when you combine sashimi tuna, salmon, kingfish, prawn, crab and scallop and roll it in to one? A seafood party known as a Japanese rainbow sushi roll.

It sounds a bit left of centre, like the infamous turducken, where a chicken is stuffed inside a duck, which is then squeezed into a turkey, and baked. This melange, I promise you, looks far prettier and won’t make you blow out your belt anywhere near as much. You’ll find it at Sumeshiya Japanese Restaurant, a simple little eatery tucked down a side street in Manning. Oh, and they fit caviar and avocado in there too. Really.

I visit after a friend raves about her favourite local. It’s busy, she warns, and Uber Eats drivers form a constant queue. But, she argues, it’s totally worth it.

We arrive to a kitchen full of chefs working like energiser bunnies in a tiny, open cooking space. The floor is black on grey, with some cultural motifs and door curtains splashed around and a traditional, low-to-the-ground dinner table in a private nook. Wait staff are shy, warm and polite, in keeping with the Japanese way. It’s all very culturally appropriate. Plus, it’s BYO.

The food follows suit. Beyond the excellent rainbow roll ($20 for eight pieces) — our pick of the night — we’re wowed by a sashimi plate jammed with fat strips of petal-soft, raw seafood ($35 for 16 pieces). The quality is impressive, as are the hues of glistening pinks; within the mix, the tuna is a deep carnation and the kingfish a soft blush, while the salmon is radiant coral.

In the tempura department, we learn the deep-fried oysters are a house speciality. The petit specimens are flown in, frozen, from Japan, breaded and served with dipping sauce ($11.50). Meanwhile, high-quality, locally sourced crustaceans are used in the prawn tempura ($16.90), cooked until crisp on the outside while juicy on the inside. The vegetable rendition ($10.90) has been battered too thick and cooked too fast, but the pumpkin and zucchini slices are acceptable.

The menu is extensive so we shift gears and head into bowl-food land. The chicken udon ($12.50) sears into the memory via its topping of crisp skinned bird, sliced into chopstick-manageable pieces. The noodles below are typically springy and slippery and the light broth is brimming with steamy flavour.

The tonkotsu ramen ($12.50) looks the part but doesn’t wow us in the same way. The milky soup is thin, overly salty and just doesn’t hit those creamy, unctuous, pork-bone flavour notes in the I-could-slurp-this-till-the-day-I-die kind of way that ramen usually delivers. The house-made noodles are up there, but it’s not enough to want to order this one again.

Eel is something I always go for if it’s available — to me it tastes like a marriage of chicken and scallops. Here, it’s rolled into a nori cone, otherwise known as temaki sushi, and presented in a holder like those for ice-cream. The eel is lost in the mix of cream cheese, lettuce, cucumber and rice, but for $5 it’s excellent value.

Overall, Sumeshiya is a good option south of the river that excels at everything raw.

SUMESHIYA JAPANESE RESTAURANT

Address: 59 Ley Street, Manning, 9313 3605

www.sumeshiya.com.au

Open: Tue-Sun, 11:30am-2:30pm & 5pm-9pm

Bookings: Yes

Licenced: Yes, BYO is $3 a head

Fleur’s Verdict: 13/20