Sushi Ran owner charts new territory at Nomica in San Francisco

It took Yoshi Tome 30 years to open a follow-up to Sushi Ran in Sausalito, a restaurant that has been on top from the day it opened and whose alumni have created some of the best Japanese restaurants in the Bay Area, like Ju-ni, Kusakabe and Village Sake.

With such a well-regarded reputation, Tome didn’t want to invite comparisons. So when the opportunity arose to open a new restaurant in San Francisco, he decided to try a totally different concept. At Nomica on Market Street, he highlights a broader style of Japanese cooking, with a more inventive spirit.

To telescope the intent, Tome and his designers gave the dining room a modern Japan-meets-California sensibility. Chef Hiroo Nagahara, who has an extensive background in both sushi and in Western kitchens, crafts food that is equally rooted in his culture and his creative instincts.

The Nomica menu may feature raw fish, such as marinated salmon belly ($17), but the focus is on combinations such as chicken and waffles ($22) with Japanese-style karaage chicken and crisp beer waffles with truffled maple and matcha butter. It’s a dish that plays into America’s love of sweet-savory combinations.

Nagahara’s signature will undoubtedly be the whole chicken in brioche ($100) that must be ordered 24 hours in advance. The 4-pound bird takes five days to prepare because it is brined for 24 hours in koji, rested for another day or two, stuffed with miso butter and then slow-cooked sous vide for about 14 hours. It’s then placed in its cottony brioche nest and baked for two more hours. When ready to be served, the waiter rolls a cart holding a heavy black pot to the table and cuts the bronzed, lacquered crust into pie-shaped wedges. He roughly slices the chicken and pours on rich miso butter sauce spiked with vinegar. The pot and the plate of bread are then placed on the table.

While $100 seems expensive, it’s worth the price for the presentation alone, and the richness of the combination is ample enough for four. The chicken turned out to be the best dish on all four of my visits.

Two other items destined for signature status are glazed brioche rolls ($12) — flaky pastry layered with shiitake and koji duxelles and served with a jidori yolk whipped with beef fat — and the karaage chicken ($14), where the two pieces were neatly formed into a thick square, fried, dusted with matcha salt and displayed in a bowl filled with crumpled newspapers. The moist chicken was served with bearnaise aioli, creating an interesting East-West interpretation that is also woven into other dishes such as the sea bass ($26) served with tomato-marinated prawns, red quinoa and black togarashi spice blend.

When the waiter brought out the crab donabe ($38), a preparation that serves two and takes 40 minutes to cook, the aroma of ginger boldly announced its arrival, creating an automatic mouthwatering response. The waiter spooned the rice into individual bowls and topped each with salmon roe, furthering the anticipation. However the excitement deflated with each bite of gluey rice that overshadowed the essence of the seafood.

These table-side presentations helped form a bond between diner and server. It feels very communal. Unfortunately, at times the staff can be tone-deaf, interrupting conversation for no good reason, or explaining the menu even when being told that everyone understands the concept. In those cases the service began to feel scripted and indicates the waiters aren’t really listening to customers.

It was a similar situation with some of the chef’s dishes, where the intent doesn’t necessarily play out as intended. Koshihikari risotto ($19) with grilled corn, snap peas, green beans, flower petals and a jidori egg whip was sweetly redundant when coming after the chicken wings ($12) stuffed with a ground filling and thickly glazed with yuzo kosho and chile oil. Sweetness also dominated the gooey braised beef cheeks balanced on a slice of raw tuna with corn puree ($12). It was an interesting combination, but the tuna was lost in an avalanche of competing flavors.

After consuming items like the five-spice duck leg ($24) — a take on cassoulet using soy beans, Chinese sausage and duck fat rice and the rib eye steak with a sesame puree poured table side — I longed for something fresh and crunchy. I got it with the grilled fish ($28), an expertly cooked kinmedai with fleshy maitake mushrooms and an artistic garnish of vegetable ash that looked like ground charcoal. Off to the side was a slab of savoy cabbage that was blackened on top but otherwise raw, acrid and unseasoned. So much for refreshment.

Many dishes ended up leaving similar impressions because they hit the same texture and flavor notes. As much as I appreciated each separately, by the end of the meal I was living the culinary equivalent of “Groundhog Day.”

It wasn’t until my fourth visit when relief appeared on the menu. It was a root vegetable appetizer ($12) with roasted beets and still-crunchy pickled carrots and mizuna. It finally offered a new inviting note. More varied dishes like this would go a long way in giving depth to the menu.

The four desserts followed a similar creative flow of blending cultures, whether a coconut parfait with tapioca, peanuts and makrut lime ($10) or foie gras ice cream with hazelnut streusel and 25-year-old balsamic ($14). There was also shiso semifreddo with tart apple sorbet ($12) and a miso-chocolate cremeaux with blackberry sorbet ($12). For the most part these seemed more fully realized than the savory courses.

The dining room, most recently home to Pesce, is as intricately conceived. The Japanese-inspired space includes a slatted ceiling, wooden floors and chunky wood tables. It is bustling but also calming. The 70-seat dining room is visually separated from the bar by an open wood screen. Behind the bar, bartenders turn out combinations that bridge the cultural divide. Sutro’s Onsen ($12), for example, is a take on the all-American martini using locally produced gin, dry vermouth, génépy (an herbal liquor from France), hinoki (a Japanese cypress) and drops of olive oil.

A lot of thought has gone into every element of Nomica and there’s much to love about it. The pieces are in place, but now everything needs tightening. Tome waited 30 years for a second place, so I’m willing to wait a while for his vision to be fully realized.

★ ★½

Nomica

Food: ★ ★

Service: ★ ★ ½

Atmosphere: ★ ★ ★

Price: $$$

Noise: Four Bells

2223 Market St. (near Sanchez), San Francisco; (415) 655-3280 or nomicasf.com. Dinner 5:30-11 p.m. Monday-Saturday. Full bar. Reservations and credit cards accepted. Difficult street parking.