O Ya

Named #1 New Restaurant in America by New York Times Critic Frank Bruni^[1]. Excerpt below: With the possible exception of a certain turbulent campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination, there may be something to these husband-and-wife tag teams. At O Ya Tim and Nancy Cushman successfully divvy up the emotional impact they want their restaurant to have on you. Running the kitchen, he takes charge of dazzling, and does so with intricate, stunningly creative dishes grounded in, but not restrained by, Japanese tradition. Running the front of the house, she takes charge of soothing, and I saw an example of that the moment I arrived. Two women ahead of me approached the hostess stand and asked her if she had any unreserved tables. She didn’t. So she gave them a detailed rundown of the restaurants nearby. Then she called the ones that interested the two women. She made them a reservation, gave them walking directions. And off they went — to dine at one of her competitors. The Cushmans don’t have any children other than O Ya, a fussed-over, tightly clutched baby that Tim Cushman, 55, dreamed about over the decades that he worked as a restaurant consultant, helping other chefs realize their ambitions. In Los Angeles in the 1980’s, he dined in Nobu Matsuhisa’s restaurant and even, for a few days, worked beside him. Later he traveled to Japan, gathering new ideas. Nancy, 34, has been there with him and on her own, and is the architect of the impressive sake list at O Ya, whose name is a Japanese expression of curiosity. The restaurant, plotted with excellence more than profit in mind, reflects extraordinary pride. Although it has just 37 seats, 17 of them at an L-shaped sushi counter, there are as many as five chefs in addition to Mr. Cushman working on a given night. They execute a menu with about 80 savory dishes, few of them simple, and just as many sauces and dressings a night. The front side of the menu is devoted to sushi and sashimi ($8 to $28 for two or three pieces), almost all of it given embellishments much more elaborate and unexpected than wasabi and shiso. A raw oyster was crowned with minuscule scoops of ponzu-marinated watermelon and diced cucumbers. It was an ideal palate primer at the start of the meal. A fried oyster shared its rice bed with a house-made yuzu aioli, a julienne of Japanese leek and “squid bubbles,” a froth of oyster juice, squid ink, olive oil and milk. It was a one-bite affair, but what a bite — briny, creamy, alive with different textures and flavors. Mr. Cushman’s idea of what belongs on a pedestal of rice isn’t limited to salmon, tuna, eel and uni, though O Ya has all of that. It extends to seared foie gras, which he bathes in balsamic vinegar, chocolate and raisins. I ordered a second piece as soon as I finished the first. There was no way I was leaving O Ya with the memory of just one. The flip side of the menu has such categories as pork (kurobuta), beef (wagyu) and chicken (poulet rouge), the last of which yielded a “ballotine of chicken wing” ($12) that exemplified the kitchen’s painstaking efforts. The boned wing had been brined overnight in a mixture including tea and yuzu juice; stuffed with a pâte of ground chicken, shiitake mushrooms and Napa cabbage; and deep-fried. Then it was placed over tangy house-made kimchi and drizzled with scallion ginger oil, fresh yuzu zest and toasted sesame seeds. My companion marveled, “It’s like a chicken bone just melted in my mouth.” At the risk of putting my credentials as a carnivore in doubt, I must say that the best dish on the menu — maybe the best dish of my entire journey — came from the menu’s vegetable category. Called “grilled sashimi of chanterelle and shiitake,” ($18) it seemed to me to settle any and all debate over umami, which has to exist if only to explain why these thinly sliced mushrooms, brushed with soy sauce and a rosemary garlic oil, have such a full, magnificent taste. Sesame gets some credit. In fact sesame gets a lot of credit, contributing to both a froth of porcini and milk that covers the so-called sashimi and to a brittle that’s sprinkled on the froth. The desserts at O Ya don’t live up to what precedes them. It doesn’t matter. You might end up spending $125 a person on the restaurant’s modestly portioned dishes. It’s worth it. The quality of the ingredients, the warmth of the service and the coziness of the setting — a dark, weathered, brick-walled room that was built as a firehouse a century ago and rejects clichéd sushi-bar sleekness — will convince you of that. And you’ll walk out the restaurant’s inconspicuous front door, off a cobblestone alley in an oddly somnolent neighborhood near the main train station, wondering whether you should keep this little secret or shout it out loud.