Portfolio at NYU

Posted 01.05.08
You've Got a Friend
Fishing for sushi in an unlikely locale.

By Freda Moon

Published in the New Haven Advocate on September 27, 2007

Friend House
538 Boston Post Rd., Orange. (203) 795-6888.

Eating out isn't really about eating. Not usually anyway. Eating out-"dining," when it costs a day's salary-is about the experience of eating. Sometimes the food is experimentation, other times it's comfort. Sometimes going to a restaurant is about seeing and being seen, more than that "fill 'er up" moment, when the stomach growls and the head groans with hunger.

Eating out is like a first date: Expectations are central to its success, and like a first date, it's always better to be overwhelmed by surprise than just simply satisfied. Why else would stumbling into a truly special restaurant while shopping for a quick bite feel so much like meeting the love of your life at a dive bar?

When Friend House popped up at the Orange strip mall next door to Trader Joe's-my favorite surfer dude--themed specialty grocery store-it felt like that kind of fate. It was a crap day, a hot day where the summer seemed like it was trying to kill me and I didn't have the energy to fight back. I'd just gone shopping, but wasn't up to cooking what I'd bought. "Why not?" I thought. The thing about Friend House that led me to ignore first impressions was simple: I'm a sucker for sushi-and Friend House billed itself as "Asian fusion, sushi and bar."

Tim and I arrived at Friend House early on a Saturday night. It was bright outside, the parking lot was barren. Hungry, skeptical, looking for sustenance without expense, we plopped ourselves at a booth-not seeing, really, the place that we'd stumbled into. The menu was promising, with 21 "special rolls" (including the Chilean sea bass roll, which I was too consumed by guilt-because sea bass are over-fished-to try, and several that featured fruit).

When our first appetizer arrived, I realized that we were in for more than we expected. The tobiko duo ($10) was a heart-shaped molded mound of spicy tuna and salmon-thick hunks of each-topped with bright, glistening red tobiko (fish roe). It looked like a kitschy dessert on its clamshell-shaped plate, but the fish was fantastic (there was enough of both types to relish each)-and the tobiko was more than window dressing: It added a textural pop, matching the spice of that "spicy tuna." Our second appetizer, a white tuna tataki ($10), was slices of my favorite raw fish-so thin as to be almost translucent-with the skin still on, laid out on cucumber planks-with a sweet-spicy wasabi sauce and a daikon radish garnish.

Now, with a bit of food in my stomach, I looked around. The place itself-with its gentle, low light glowing from cylindrical paper shades, tall-backed wooden chairs and booths upholstered a motif of blue and wispy reeds-was handsome. The waitress-whom I should have recognized from another of my favorite sushi spots in town, New Haven's Akasaka-wore all black and held her hair in a long, thin ponytail. The entire scene was the picture of cool. But instead of the reserve the setting suggested, Friend House was, well, friendly. It was the kind of friendly I miss living in the Northeast, where the weather's not the only thing that's chilly.

Our many small courses appeared one after the next, perfectly paced, totally beautiful. There were deft uses of fruit (the Waikiki roll, $10, was bright yellow mango-tart and sweet-with generous dollops of red tobiko, thick hunks of cool salmon, ripe avocado and a sweet mango sauce) and spice (the spicy girl, $12, with a not-for-sissies spicy salmon inside, wrapped with fresh tuna on top and sprinkled with sesame seeds), along with quality cuts of fish for sushi and sashimi. The special rolls were special: complex pairings of fresh, unusual ingredients and house-made sauces-all oddly familiar. Where had I tasted the fantastic "fantastic tuna," with its mint, strawberries, white tuna, avocado, black tobiko and crunch of tempura flakes? Why were the smooth mustardy sauces similarly familiar?

It turns out that Friend House sushi chef Peter Li owned Akasaka some years back, before heading to New York to seek fame and fortune in the big city. He ended up working at the New York outpost of the mega-restaurant cum theme park Tao, where he worked alongside a kitchen crew of 200 people and met his partner, Ken Yang. The two decided to start a restaurant, and chose Orange as the place to do it.

Friend House is slicker looking than Akasaka and the fact that it calls itself a fusion restaurant means you'll find things like Thai mango chicken and Hong Kong--style wonton soup on the menu (though I stuck to the many sushi options). Ultimately, the special sushi rolls at Friend House are similar enough to Akasaka to make the two restaurants seem like siblings. To Friend House's credit, that's not a bad thing. My fear would be that there's not enough room in Greater New Haven for both-but since the two are far enough apart, they'll probably both survive. There's no such thing as too much raw fish, after all.