Since its opening in fall of 2013, Sushi Nakazawa has been one of the hottest sushi restaurants in the country. Anchored by Chef Daisuke Nakazawa, famous for being featured as one of Jiro’s apprentices in Jiro Dreams of Sushi, the restaurant has earned rave reviews from New York Times food critic Pete Wells as well as many others. With that kind of hype, of course I wanted to try it out for myself.

Sushi Nakazawa has one of the more painful reservation processes that I have seen. In order to make a reservation through OpenTable, you have to be ready to click furiously at midnight. Reservations are typically gone in less than a minute for the weekends. The sushi bar, in particular, is difficult to get reservations for. We settled for the dining room this time around as we just wanted to experience the restaurant for the first time. In the future, though, I would only go if I could snag a seat at the sushi bar.

Sushi scale: 3 of 5 stars

Overall, I left disappointed. I had fairly high expectations going into the meal, with everything that I had read and heard, and the actual experience fell far short of what I anticipated. The quality of the sushi was fair, but it was by no means as impressive of an omakase meal as I had had at other New York sushi restaurants, such as Sushi Yasuda, Ushiwakamaru, or Soto. There were some delicious pieces of sushi, but there were also some pieces that were downright bad. For instance, Sushi Nakazawa should be embarrassed to serve cooked shrimp.

I understand that Chef Nakazawa was not present the day of my meal. I also understand that sitting in the dining room would not be comparable to sitting at the sushi bar. But for a high caliber restaurant, the quality of sushi should be consistently good. And it definitely was not. Below is the progression of our sushi meal:

Premium sake pairing. One of the highlights of our meal was the premium sake pairing ($80 per person). Sake pairings are not typically offered at sushi restaurants, so we took advantage. We sampled a variety of sake from different regions of Japan, and it was obvious to us that a lot of thought had been put into the selections for the pairing.

King salmon (Washington) / Pink salmon with sea salt (Hokkaido). Both salmon pieces were fresh and tasty.

Seared mirugai / sea scallop (Massachusetts). The mirugai was rather fishy, but the scallop was firm and sweet.

Pike mackerel / cutlassfish / aji. I enjoyed the cutlassfish in particular. It was a fish that I had never tried before, and I always appreciate it when sushi restaurants introduce me to new types of fish. The cutlassfish was paired with lemon and salt accents, and the result was delicious. The aji, on the other hand, did not taste fresh. It was a stark contrast to the excellent aji that I had had at the Tsukiji Fish Market in Tokyo earlier this year.

Spot prawn / boiled amber shrimp. This plate was the biggest issue of the meal for me. The spot prawn was unpleasantly chewy and lacked sweetness. The boiled shrimp, though, was by far the worst piece that was served. I am not a fan of cooked shrimp to begin with, but this was just offensive. The tough texture of the shrimp made the piece difficult to bite into and practically inedible.

Japanese bonito / bonito. These pieces of bonito were solid.

Chutoro / akamai. The chutoro was not as fatty as I would have liked, and the akamai was average.

Ikura (Alaska) / uni (Santa Barbara). The uni was fresh and melted in my mouth.

Tamago / anago. Tamago is known to be Chef Nakazawa’s specialty, so I was not surprised that this was one of the best pieces of tamago I have tasted. I preferred the more mild-flavored tamago at Sushi Muzutani a little more, but this tamago is second-best in my book.

Yuzu sorbet. The citrus-y flavor of the yuzu made for a refreshing dessert.

Overall, I had a good sushi meal. But it was nowhere near the quality that I was expecting from a sushi restaurant of its reputation. When I went to Sushi Mizutani in Tokyo earlier this year (helmed by Chef Mizutani, another of Jiro’s disciples), my expectations were even higher, and the restaurant surpassed my wildest hopes and dreams to deliver the best sushi meal of my life. To this day, even thinking about the rice at Sushi Mizutani makes me salivate. Sushi Nakazawa, unfortunately, was not even close to that.

Maybe my meal was an anomaly and not representative of a typical meal at Sushi Nakazawa. Well, it that’s the case, I would be willing to give Sushi Nakazawa another try in the future at the sushi bar. But until then, I will be making my rounds at Sushi Yasuda and Ushiwakamaru, two restaurants that I know will serve consistently great omakase meals.

Sushi Nakazawa, 23 Commerce St., New York, NY, 10014