Maki in Tokyo

Hi,

Does anybody know a restaurant especially for Maki in Tokyo?

I know lots of good Sushi/Running-Sushi places which I like very much!

But I receive a visit who does not like Sushi but likes Maki (without raw fish) very much!

And the normal Sushi restaurant have 99% Sushi and only very few Maki.

And I want to avoid to go to the super market and buy a Maki box ;-)

I can not imagine that there is no special restaurant for Maki?!

It would be great if it would be central (around Tokyo, Ueno, Ikebukuro, Shinjuku) and maybe about 2000 Yen...

WHen you say "maki," do you mean the cucumber roll and other "rolled" sushi? If that's what you mean, we call them "maki-zushi," so from the name you can tell it's after all still "sushi."

Unfortunately there is no restaurant (as far as I know) that specializes in non-fish rolled sushi... it's something we buy at supermarkets to eat at home, or prepare ourselves at home...

I guess by "sushi" you mean "nigiri-zushi" and by "maki" you mean "maki-zushi". They both are "sushi". Perhaps you could just order "kappa", "oshinko" and so on. If cooked seafoods are ok, there are some more options.

Hi,

Yes of course, I mean maki-zushi.

Hmm, 残念ですね。。

In principle cooked seafood would be OK. The main problem is that the guest really loves maki-zushi over all and for a few weeks I always hear ''I am looking forward to come to Japan so hard in order to eat Maki-zushi''. And I said no problem, on the first day we will go for eating maki-zushi.

So if there is no specific maki-zushi restaurant, is there at least a restaurant with a vast selection?

On the one hand I do not want to buy those boxes in the supermarket on the first day on the other hand I do not want to go to a sushi restaurant with 99% of nigiri-sushi and just two maki-zushi available :-/

Where is your guest coming from, and where has he had such a range of "maki-zushi"?

In Japan in sushi restaurants, you're looking at "nigiri-zushi" mostly (which contains mostly fresh fish fillets, but also cooked seafood such as eel, or egg), and the only "maki-zushi" you have would be cucumber (kappa), tuna (tekka) - after all fresh fish -, and pickled vegetable (oshinko).

If he is possibly talking about so-called "California rolls," containing avocado, grilled salmon, grilled shrimp and the like, note that those are not genuine Japanese dishes - you'll need to look for Pacific cuisine restaurants then.

If you are talking about "futomaki zushi," the fat rolls with a lot of cooked ingredients, again, those are mostly eaten at home :(

Yeah, you're only going to find mostly nigiri in sushi restaurants. Think of it this way, how many sushi rolls would a store have to sell (an keep in mind that they don't have close to the same profit margins as most nigiri-sushi) to stay alive? That and as mentioned earlier, te-maki is something that's more commonly eaten in the home.

I think your best option is to go to a revolving sushi restaurant. They usually have much more selection of maki-sushi. For example, they often have salad-maki and a small number of others that escape my mind at this moment...

In continental Europe I have seen restaurants like this (actually I've seen a branch of this restaurant), where they served "maki-zushi" in combination with some other dishes they call Japanese - he might be thinking of something like this (I can't get the individual images to come through on my PC; but the descriptions for "sushi pack" is legible):
http://www.sasou.de/

I must say some of it is not genuine Japanese, and the "maki zushi" that are genuinely Japanese are often bought as take-away from shops and enjoyed at home/office. Maybe you can take your guest to the basement (food section!) of good department stores, and purchase what he prefers :)

Are there any sushi boat places in Tokyo that anyone can recommend? (not just a regular sushi go round or regular conveyor belt sushi - I have heard of some that have small boats going around with the sushi on top).

Here in the US we even have one that has a small train that takes the sushi around.

It may not be as authentic or as high of a standard as some other types of sushi restaurants, but we'd like to try one. I've heard there are some, am researching, but am having trouble. Anyone?