Alyssa
I love sushi; I wouldn’t even shy away from the word obsessed. Osaka, with locations at 4902 Broadway and 11851 Bandera, is one of the first sushi restaurants I came across during my teen years, and still frequent today. My favorite time to visit is during lunch because the bento boxes come with two full sushi rolls, two pieces of fried gyoza, a house salad, soup and a beautifully cut orange.
Osaka offers sushi and teppanyaki – a style of Japanese cuisine that uses an iron griddle to cook food. When you enter the restaurant, you’re greeted by the hostess and taken to a booth, table or teppanyaki table. Jacqueline and I tend to find ourselves in booths, watching the sushi chefs create beautiful rolls and listening to the teppanyaki chefs crack jokes during their cooking segment.
Pictured above is the amazing lunch bento box I spoke about. There are two sushi bento boxes and seven kitchen bento boxes. The sushi bento boxes can consist of two rolls or one roll and four pieces of nigiri. The kitchen bento boxes feature soup, salad, steamed rice, two pieces of gyoza and a four piece California roll. The entrees range from sesame chicken to BBQ beef.
Not surprisingly, I ordered the bento box with two sushi rolls. This particular lunch is $11.95, however, you can upgrade your rolls for an additional $2.50 per roll. I ordered the rainbow roll – assorted raw fish topped on a California roll – and the salmon roll. The salmon roll at Osaka is unlike any other salmon rolls I’ve seen because instead of one piece of salmon, there’s multiple pieces causing the roll to be enormous.
Jacqueline ordered the American ninja roll – a deep fried roll with crab mix and cream cheese and topped with eel sauce and spicy mayo – and the longhorn roll – a shrimp tempura roll topped with crab. All of the rolls were amazing. Of course we shared!
Not only does Osaka have an amazing lunch special, but its happy hour is quite amazing as well. Monday through Thursday from 4 to 7 p.m., you can order two sushi rolls for $15 or three for $20. Draft beer is also on special for $3 and sake bombs are a mere $6.
Have you been to Osaka? What’s your favorite sushi roll?