My parents from Korea are scheduled to visit our home later this summer, so my wife Jun and I wanted to check out a few places where we could take them out for a sushi dinner. I have been aware of the buzz created by Love, Makoto, a food hall created by celebrity chef Makoto Okuwa who used to work at the acclaimed DC sushi restaurant Sushi Taro (which, by the way, we still need to visit at some point), but somehow the restaurants in this space (Dear Sushi, Beloved BBQ and Hiya Izakaya) have not been at the top of our restaurant wish list. With a more concrete mission on hand, we decided to see what the dinner at Dear Sushi would be like. We both agreed that while there were some interesting pieces, the restaurant might not be an ideal place for people closer to sushi purists.

When I booked a spot for us at the “Bar Seat,” I assumed that we would be sitting right in front of one of the chefs preparing the dishes. It turned out that this was literally in front of a bar where service staffs were on hand to help with diners and serve drinks. The omakase price was at a fairly reasonable $85 per person, and a short “love letter” from the chef to sushi at the top of the menu was a nice touch. Somewhat curiously, unlike other sushi restaurants we had been to, we were first served hand rolls after some snacks instead of nigiris. The central theme at Dear Sushi is the contrast between old school (relying on traditional ingredients and techniques) and new school (relying on unexpected ingredients and techniques), and that theme was displayed prominently in the tuna hand roll wrapped in nori and the baked crab roll wrapped in white soy paper that I had never seen before. Same for the nigiri pieces that followed, all coming in pairs of old school and new school.

While Jun and I are generally in favor of more traditional styles of sushi, surprisingly it was the new school pieces that were more delicious, such as king salmon with shiso tapenade and, in a pleasant surprise, fresh shaved truffle, as well as bluefin tuna with miso marinated uni and eel sauce, Hamachi with ponzu and red chili, and hay smoked fatty tuna with ume miso. I also think the skillful use of these unexpected ingredients somewhat masked the at times surprisingly pedestrian quality of the fish that were used in these nigiris. In addition to the pieces from the omakase option, we also tried a piece of fluke and striped jack without adornments, and they were just OK and not particularly memorable. We concluded our meal with a delightful frozen strawberry dessert that somewhat recovered our mixed experience.

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Getting a reservation at Dear Sushi won’t be terribly difficult and the turnover at the restaurant is fairly quick. If you feel still hungry after the omakase menu, there are a number of appetizers, entrees and individual nigiri pieces that you can order to complement your meal. There is a full bar with cocktails, wines and sakes but I didn’t get the sense that the restaurant was very invested in the sake offerings. At times, Dear Sushi offered some delicious pieces with a nice touch of experimental spirit; when it comes to a sushi restaurant, however, Jun and I fervently believe it is the core quality of the fish that matters above all, and in that department, Dear Sushi felt short of our expectations.

Address: 200 Massachusetts Avenue NW, Washington, DC 20001

KenScale: 7.5/10 (Jun’s Score: 7.5/10)

Website: https://www.lovemakoto.com/

Reservation via Resy