This is a Japanese small plate restaurant hidden in the U St area of DC. No sign out front, look for the blank black door that has a lot more traffic than the restaurant or whatever it is next door. No reservations, put your name down, there will probably be a wait. If the wait is 30 mins or so, you can walk 4 blocks towards 9:30 Club and Fast Gourmet and hit American Ice Company, which almost always has good beer on tap including Bells Kalamazoo Stout. Once inside, this is a real experience: order multiple small plates to share. The menu has a handful of recurring items like the miso glazed Chilean seabass. But half the menu changes daily. It is a plain sheet of paper with handwritten dishes. Sometimes a special will be handwritten in the margins inside of a drawing. Look carefully so you don’t miss something. Ask the server what is good and you will not be disappointed. I’ve had whole smoked mackerel on the bone, blowfish, various sashimi. Don’t wimp out and just order sushi. Beer and sake selection is solid. Little to no beer on tap, perhaps Japanese macro on tap. But the Japanese bottle list for beer is impressive, probably up to 20 bottles with many bizarre Japanese beers that are hard to find elsewhere. Sake selection also good at probably 50-60 bottles. Works really well as a date place, special occasion place. Come here for the food, and perhaps pick up some random sake and Japanese beer ticks.

This is in a common DC rowhouse that, in this case, used to be the neighborhood barber shop. Downstairs is a typical sushi style bar where you can watch the chefs prepare food. Upstairs is more like a standard restaurant with minimalist decor. The food is amazing - everything is small plates, so you can try a variety of dishes. The dish of the night was the sardines, although the baby octopus was also very tasty (both were cooked). The have a lot of different sake, of course, but also more than a dozen Japanese beers, each of whichnpaired very well with the food - subtle flavors, nothing extreme. Prices are high, and with small dishes, it adds up quickly. Overall a very nice experience.