Ukai

A few nights ago, a group of friends got together to celebrate my very tallest friend's 33rd birthday. We went to Ukai, (website is under construction) the one on the West Side of town near Horrock's. I had never been there. Hibachi grills always remind me of my favorite episode of The Office, where Michael and Andy bring back two waitresses to the office Christmas party and sing "Your Body is a Wonderland."

It was a weeknight, it was late, we were all starving to death. Oddly enough, the place was PACKED. I wondered where all these businesspeople came from. Was there a businessperson convention at the dump across the street that used to be a TGI Friday's?

Sidenote: my two best girlfriends and I went to that TGI Friday's like every week in high school. We always ate some combination of Jack Daniels shrimp and potato skins, or some such garbage. We also always aet the Oreo Madness, which was good as hell. I would eat it right now if there was a TGI Friday's anywhere to be found.

Anyway, back to Ukai. My friend BG and I decided to order a sushi roll in addition to our hibachi chicken dinners, because we were famished. We got the Michigan roll, which I know had crab in it. That's about all I remember. It was normal, average, good. Whatever. But the salmon on top was above-average. I don't know what they did to that fish, but it tastes like Jesus himself made it. Or caught it. Or provided it to the sushi chef at Ukai. I also ordered some edamame, which the server brought out with a shaker of sea salt. You're telling me you couldn't have put that on yourself, backstage? Do I have to do everything around here?

The hibachi chef came in and did his show, threw an egg shell into his tall hat, made the birthday boy shoot sake into an onion volcano from a statute of a little boy to look like he was peeing. You know, totally normal. I ate my steamed rice, chicken, zucchini, onion, and bean sprouts and got the heck out of there so I could wake up bright and early for cardio jump rope the next morning.

Also, the service was not great. Granted, the restaurant was busy and there was a bunch of us. However, we had made arrangements to be seated in a private room and they should have taken into consideration the fact that the room would be full. It took forever to order, and when my pal KM accidentally grabbed a hot plate and threw edamame all over the place as a result, the waitress just watched her do it and didn't lift a finger. She wouldn't have been invited to the office Christmas party, I'll tell you that.