15 EAST

A funny thing happens when your friends have babies. They disappear. You don’t see them for a while. As much as you want to, and as much as you talk about how you’ll help, how you’ll visit, during those first few weeks and even months, this rare form of madness falls over your friend the new mother as her life ceases to be her own and becomes merely a proxy for nutrition, hydration, burping, bathing, and diaper changing for her young infant. Her boobs are attached to the mouth of a hungry little peanut, and her sleep schedule is so erratic that at any moment she may be down for the count. When Stacey had her daughter Ella in November, I was at the hospital the day after admiring this beautiful little girl she and her boyfriend had created, and when I left I planned on many visits to her Tribeca apartment. In the five months that Ella has been with us I have seen Stacey three times. The first two weeks I visited weekly, but then I felt like I was in the way, like every time Ella started to doze off, Stacey wanted to do the same and I was the reason she wasn’t. And going out was something she just couldn’t do. Not that I blamed her, it was just a very intense time for her when she was adjusting to being the caregiver for this life that needed her constantly, and she really didn’t have time for things like dinner and a movie.

Last week, all that changed. Stacey has re-joined the world of working mothers and upon returning to work, hired a nanny. As soon as she signed on the dotted line, we made plans for dinner. Knowing that Stacey is a huge sushi lover, we made plans to have dinner at 15 East, Marco Moreira and Jo-Ann Makovitzky’s serene sushi salon in the former Tocqueville space.

15 East is an elegant place, not so much so that you feel the need to dress up, but just enough that you wouldn’t expect to call up for delivery. The space was designed by Richard Block of Masa and Honmura An, with a minimalist sensibility in cool shades of gray and ivory, with a soothing linen lighting that casts the room with a soft pale glow. The sushi bar, crafted from a single plank of dark chocolate colored African bubbinga wood, is lit from above by long white lamps that spotlight each of its nine seats. If you prefer to sit at a proper table, the dining room offers tables for two along a plush banquette or seating for four or more along a windowed wall.

If it’s just two people, as it was the other night when Stacey and I had dinner, you should try to grab a pair of seats at the sushi bar. (This bar is especially comfortable with seriously plush seats with nice high backs.) You can watch the action and often get a few special treats from the chef.

Stacey and I scored two seats and started with a carafe of sake as we pondered the menu, which offers selections from Marco’s menu in the kitchen or sushi chef Masato (Masa) Shimizu’s menu from the sushi bar. We went for a little of both, and as we folded our menus and placed our order, Stacey’s glass was already empty. Our waiter refilled her glass. She had a big grin on her face, “Wow, this sake is good! It’s so great to be out again!” she said, her smile growing bigger. I was laughing. “It’s good to have you out, but just take it easy there, you’re gonna be wasted,” I warned. “I know! It feels so good! I haven’t had a drink in over a year.” She did have a point. I decided to leave her to her sake.

We settled into our first course, the Degustation of Sea Lettuces. Only in New York, I thought, do we have the privilege of a tasting a medley of sea lettuces. And I have to say, all kidding aside, these were some fine sea lettuces. I am going to harvest some of my own this summer at the beach and see if I can recreate this dish, though I doubt it. Maybe I’ll just make a body wrap instead. Anyway, back to the dish, there were about five on the plate, and they resembled oversized snowflakes in various shades of green—sage, moss, and lime. They are served with a bright miso and soy dressing that gently coats the leaves and gives them a lot more personality but I think you should also try them naked, so their soft subtle flavors can be appreciated.

Our next course was a round of buffalo frog’s legs with tofu blue cheese dressing. Yes, buffalo frog’s legs. These get the same swipe of spicy red sauce as their chicken wing counterparts but the frog’s meat is more delicate and sweet, and there’s something just completely ridiculous about eating buffalo frog’s legs that makes them taste even better.

And from the ridiculous (but delicious), came the sublime, in the form of sushi master Masa, who apprenticed with Rikio Kugo at Tokyo’s Sukeroku for seven years before moving to New York where he spent four years at Jewel Bako.

Masa runs his sushi bar like a little Inn, welcoming guests, many by name, and all with a smile of genuine warmth and hospitality. And whenever he sends you something, he turns to his bookshelf and pulls out a reference book and flips to a color photograph and a paragraph of explanation on the fish, its species and cut. It’s part dinner, part sushi school.

The night we were in, he announced that he had over 50 different kinds of fish in the house including seven different cuts of tuna, from the jaw to the belly and the tail. After showing us a wooden box filled with the freshly butchered tuna, he turned to a large clay pot. “I just made this,” he said, pulling a large muscled tentacle from the vessel. “You must taste my octopus. I slow poach it so it is so tender and soft.” I felt like I was watching a lost cut from 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea as he butchered the tentacle—the Tako Yawarakani ($9)—and sent us each a plate with a few quarter sized slices served with little mounds of fluffy sea salt. Stacey didn’t look happy. “I don’t do octopus,” she said. More for me, it was great—soft and tender, just as Masa promised, and with that hit of sea salt, just right. She also doesn’t eat Hotaru Ika ($12)—small (cold) whole firefly squid that Masa served with a sweet miso paste. These weren’t really my thing either to be honest—the squid are whole and cold and sort of slimy and chewy, but I did give them a try. I would categorize these under “acquired taste.” Meanwhile, Stacey was on her third glass of sake. Oh dear.

Feeling good, Stacey was all over the next course, a signature of Masa’s called Tai “Arai” ($18)—ice and salt-cured Japanese snapper shaved into thin silky slices and piled on top of a mound of ice and dusted with fresh grated yuzu zest, served with a dish of citrus ponzu dipping sauce. I could have eaten several orders of this dish it was so clean and light and beautiful in texture and flavor.

The same goes for a bluefin toro tartar ($22) from the kitchen that arrived next. The tartar is so finely diced that it is almost creamy, and it is served with a judicious drizzle of spicy white sauce dotted with Sevruga caviar that offers just the right amount of heat to the fish. We were then placed back in Masa’s capable hands for a course of sashimi served with house-pickled ginger and fresh wasabi (it’s ground in front of you) that included bluefin toro tail, yellowtail, arctic char (wow), botan shrimp, Japanese black bass, and Japanese mackerel, organized like artwork on a square ceramic plate. All of the fish was exquisite, each piece speaking its own mind— whether strong (mackerel), mild (yellowtail), and somewhere in between (black bass).

Our next course was something called Kakiage ($12), which is essentially a latke, or for those of you who aren’t familiar with the term latke (hello, Hanukah), a fried potato pancake, in this case made from shredded carrots, zucchini and onions and whole shrimp served with key lime wedges and house-flavored sea salts in chile, curry, and green tea. These sea salts were amazing—so lively, intense, and fragrant. You could dust them on old shoelaces and have an inspired meal.

Next came a magnificent serving of cool soba noodles, hand-made by Hideji Asanuma, the same artisan who made them at the now shuttered Homnura An. They are hand-cut and the right textural balance of chewy and silky, served with warm soy dashi and scallions and topped with a custardy lump of fresh and briny sea urchin.

The last course of the night was a selection of sushi, which Masa slices into finger-length dominoes and lightly seasons per piece—with soy, yuzu, miso, lemon, shiso, or some other fine accent to make the fish come to life in your mouth without the need for additional dips in the soy bath. (We ate our sushi a la a carte, but the sushi omakase is $55 per person, a great value.) Next to your plate is a thin white napkin folded so that you can use it to wipe your fingers between each piece. I’d never seen a finger cleaning apparatus before and neither had Stacey who picked it up, looked at it with curiosity, and then proceeded to unfold it and used it to cleanse her face. “I don’t know what this is for, but I’m gonna use it to wash my face,” she said. “Go for it,” I said, as she moved from chin to forehead.

Our waiter watched her facial bathing ritual, and when she was done he came over and removed her crumpled up napkin, and replaced it with a fresh one, gently explaining that this was not a washcloth but merely a device to be used to wipe off fingers in between pieces of sushi. “Oh, okay,” she said, and without skipping a beat added, “I’m actually not hungry any more, but do you have any after-dinner sushi?” I laughed. “Stacey, I think you mean after-dinner Sake?” I was now cracking up. She smiled. “Yes! That’s what I mean! After-dinner sake!” She looked slightly embarrassed and turned to me. “Pumpkin (that is what she calls me), I haven’t been out for 10 months,” she said. “Have pity on me, please.” I did.

Our waiter, who was no doubt having a very amusing evening with us, brought her some after-dinner sake, and as I continued to eat my sushi, she continued to make up for a year without alcohol. There was a piece of bluefin tuna akami (tail) seasoned with a little yuzu and soy, a chu-toro dressed with just a touch of soy sauce, and a Jack mackerel diced up with shiso and ginger that was one of the most exciting pieces of sushi I’ve had in recent memory. In between serving me, Masa took out his trusty line of sushi books to explain specifically what cuts of fish I was eating. I wish I had paid more attention but I just nodded and smiled and hoped more sushi would come soon. It did. When I was on my last piece, a beautiful lightly seared arctic char, my neighbor (who had just eaten that very same piece) turned to me and said, “That, my dear, is crack masquerading as sushi.” I couldn’t have agreed more. Stacey just nodded and smiled as she finished her after-dinner sake.

15 East is located at 15 East 15th Street, 212-647-0015.

Andrea Strong