Gintei
During my early ventures into San Mateo and neighboring cities, I ran across Gintei, a modestly sized sushi restaurant. This was several years ago and at that time, I couldn’t get a seat. This was when I ran solo as well. Nope, no walkin seating at the sushi bar. Without of course, a long wait. Well, fast forward to now. I called them up on a whim and asked for two seats at the bar. Bingo. We had a seating within the hour. On a Friday night no less. A quick ride to the restaurant followed by some roundabouts to find parking, they have like one parking space out in front, and we were inside waiting to try this place out.
After looking through three menus, we went for the $60 USD deluxe omakase (there is a $45 USD option) which included 10 pieces of sushi followed by miso soup. We added a few more dishes because 10 pieces of nigiri may not be enough. Though we weren’t sure about the difference between the normal omakase and the deluxe. It may have been the additional starter. We should have asked before ordering our very own. Oh well. Better to leave full.
There were three sushi chefs and we had ours pretty much to ourselves. He did help prepare some other dishes, but he kept us as the priority. At his station we could spot our whole meal. It was pre-cut on a little tray and made to order once he saw us ready. He was also a social, making some small talk here and there. He inquired about my camera and didn’t seem to mind me snapping away at the food. But he kept things short not to interfere with our conversation. Most of the interaction though was when he brought out each course. Me made sure I got the exact names of the fish. I love it.
The meal took over an hour to finish and it was a very laxed atmosphere. We had plenty of sake and good food. And I can see how this place was so popular back then. However, now, there are so many other places serving fish flown in from Tsukiji Market. I was hoping that their selection would make this a regular place to visit. But one of their items that had caught my eye, kohada, was sold out. On the bright side, the fish that was available was good. Just not sure this would be one of my regular places for omakase. This would be a know what you want kind of place.
Gintei
235 El Camino Real
San Bruno, CA 94066
+1 (650) 636-4135
http://gintei.co/
Verdict: I would recommend ordering sushi a la carte here. Solid selection of fish for your nigiri.
Closing out the night was a nice refreshing dessert of strawberry panna cotta? and mango panna cotta? oh and, red bean panna cotta. Yeah, you get to choose three from five different flavors. The other two flavors being blueberry and caramel.
The miso soup had some chopped mushrooms that were much tastier in comparison with the tofu. Still, a good way to end the sushi feast.
Alright, since they were out of kohada, I decided to live it up a little with their wagyu nigiri which was lightly torched. The only issue was, it wasn�t the melt in your mouth variety. It was a bit more on the chewy side.
Usually uni closes out our sushi dinner, but we still had room. So we went for the sardine.
When the chef let us know our courses were over, we kind of looked at each other and instantly went for the uni. And thankfully, they had Hokkaido sea urchin. Mmmmmm?
Their golden eye snapper was just okay. Crazy right? This is usually one of my favorites. I think the flavors weren�t brought out as well under the torch. Not sure why.
Oh hello beautiful. I really needed this tonight. The perfect amount of fat in this tuna belly.
Not the most beautiful thing in the world, but it was fresh out of the grill.
This plump sweet shrimp was so good. It was plump and almost crunchy when you bite into it. However, it�s the taste that was so wonderful.
It�s been awhile since I had scallop. Conflicted about having it in my omakase since I never really order it. Don�t mind having it though.
Nice cut of striped jack topped with diced green onions and wasabi.
This was actually baby sea bream and it had a little citrus salt. I can�t quite see it, even in this photo, but I did taste it. It went well with this one.
Delightfully fresh hirame with your usual triming, a dash of nikiri topped with grated daikon. And tucked underneath the fish, a piece of shiso leaf. Yum!
I couldn�t get a good picture off on this one. Our chef placed it toward us. I�m so used to chefs placing it horizontally, but I snapped whatever angle I could. I soon wised up and turned it myself. Oh, and the fish, it�s pretty good. My favorite of the mackerels. And no, it wasn�t two cuts of mackerel in a row. I missed taking a photo of the one before this.
Not my favorite type of fish when it comes to sushi. So having it in my omakase as the first nigiri course was a bit worrisome. Luckily, I spotted our whole selection of fish.
This was the actual start of our deluxe omakase. A cut of cured bluefin tuna. Look at that deep color.
We actually added this cold appetizer not knowing that we had a similar serving coming. Well, if you overlook the proteins, the crab in this case. $10 USD