MOI Review | “Speedy Sushi at Soho’s 60-Minute Omakase”
The hyped Japanese restaurant has just launched a one-hour lunchtime omakaseMOI, the first restaurant from the new caps-loving MAD restaurants group, (we also reviewed their newest spot ALTA recently) has been one of the openings of the year, getting a hugely positive reception for its modern Japanese grill dishes and sushi. It’s a huge site, set across two floors on Dean Street, with a large ground floor restaurant and open kitchen, and a sushi counter and bar/listening room on the lower floor, with a ridiculously high spec sound system. There’s lots of different ways you can come and experience MOI but we are here to tell you about just one: the recently launched one hour sushi omakase menu, which is available Tuesday – Friday. Eat ThisThere are two set menus available for the one-hour omakase, one at £48 and one at £68. Both start the same, with an excellent miso soup and house pickles, and both end with sake poached pear with yuzu sorbet. In the middle they are quite different, with the cheaper menu including black bream sashimi, mackerel onigri, steamed Devon brill, and chef’s nigiri selection. We went for the £68 menu, mainly because we wanted the tuna dishes. So after the pickles we kicked off with two slices of chutoro (medium fatty tuna) sashimi, alongside thick cut black bream sashimi with slightly charred crisp skin. The chef’s nigiri selection for the day included chutoro topped with yuzo kosho, hay smoked salmon, and sea bream – all three were excellent. Next up was the final fish course of the menu, a chunky akami tuna onigri topped with confit egg yolk. The other big difference with the more premium menu is that for your ‘main’ course you get thinly sliced sirloin steak cooked over charcoal, and served with a lovely sweet sansho sauce and pickled maitake mushrooms.Drink ThisIt might be lunchtime, but no harm in trying a little carafe of sake is there? We went for an earthy, dry Yonetsuru Junmai. There are of course 0% cocktails and teas if you’re not drinking. Why GoIf this little glimpse of MOI is anything to go by, the hype around this opening is well deserved and the lunch omakase menu is a great way to try it out. We can’t wait to come back for the rest of it. Key InformationAddress | 84 Wardour St, London W1F 0TQFor more information | moirestaurant.com
