"11"^^ . "4"^^ . "After the disappointment of dining at Quiessence, I decided to try a sushi restaurant in the middle of the desert! Before you all shake your head and laugh, I had checked out their menu and figuring that they also have other branches around the world, they must be doing something right.\n\nThe restaurant is located out on N Scottsdale Rd and has ample parking. The interior of the restaurant is big and airy, unlike its London counterpart, which has tables crammed up together. There is a bar area where they carve the big pieces of ice on which the fresh fish is served. The main restaurant area is dominated by the open plan robata grill. As I was dining on my own, I chose to sit at the grill to watch/chat to the friendly chefs and to make friends. There was a good buzz about the place.\n\nI got a shock though when I opened the menu. I had my heart set on having the tasting menu to sample more dishes but the tasting menu was for a minimum of 2 people. Being the USA where the customer is king (please note, all UK restaurant owners!), I decided to ask the server to find out from the kitchen whether I would be able to have the tasting menu on my own as I had come all the way from London. I was so pleased when the server returned with a positive answer.\n\nWell, the generosity of the restaurant knew no bounds. I am sure that they served me the equivalent amount of food for 2 people with double portions of everything. I was starting to panic as the never-ending sea of food kept flowing out of the kitchen - I hate to return uneaten food to the kitchen but there was no way I was going to be able to eat all of it. Fortunately, I made friends with the diners on either side of me and between us, we did manage to eat it all.\n\nHaving had some misgivings about eating sushi in the middle of the desert, I found out from the chefs that all the food is specially flown in, mostly from abroad, so even the London branch would be getting its fish from Japan rather than Billingsgate.\n\nOnce service started, dish after dish just flowed out of the kitchen, all beautifully presented.\n\n1. Butterfish tataki - lovely delicate fish which possibly needed an accent like ginger.\n\n2. Spinach salad with peanut dressing - refreshing.\n\n3. Rock shrimp tempura with chilli mayonnaise. Very light batter enclosing just cooked shrimp.\n\n4. Premium sushi including my favourite melt in your mouth toro. Mmmmmmm.\n\n5. Wagyu gunkan with caviar. My only disappointment of the menu. I think the flavour of the super expensive beef was wasted in this preparation. Was even hard to tell it was beef. I appreciate the expense but perhaps they could do a different preparation.\n\n6. Spicy tuna roll. Lovely.\n\nThen came the robata grilled dishes.\n\n7. Sweet potato. Was a bit sceptical that it would cook enough on the grill but it was lovely and crispy.\n\n8. Black cod. Which Japanese restaurant doesn't have a version of this dish popularised by Nobu? Still wonderful with large flakes of white fish accompanied by that lovely sweet sticky sauce.\n\n9. Lamb chops with Korean spices. Huge meaty chops but moist and tender.\n\n10. Rice pot offered with vegetables or king crab. Had to be the crab though I was ready to explode by this stage! This was something new that I have never seen before. Probably best described like Japanese risotto where the crab was mixed into creamy rice and a generous amount of tobiko added some pops. There was an incredible depth of flavour that I suspect comes from a proper stock.\n\nLast but not least and I'm afraid I may have actually laughed out loud when dessert arrived. It was the most fabulous looking and enormous dessert selection served on a block of ice. I can't actually remember what was on there - my stomach may have been telling my brain to abort at this stage! However, I had a taste of everything and like the rest of the meal, it was divine.\n\nSo top marks to Roka Akor for flexibility and their generosity for feeding me and my 2 impromptu dining partners. I was happy to escape the fate of the exploding man in Monty Python's Meaning of Life sketch ('just a little wafer, monsieur') but it was the quality of the food, not its quantity which captured my stomach's praise.\n\nI was able to chat to the Scandinavian head chef later, who extracted a promise from me to go and try the London branch and let him have my honest opinion. Well, Scottsdale wins, guys! You have a more spacious restaurant, more friendly staff, amazing flexibility in customer service and more generosity with the dishes (London's 'premium' menu sushi selection only included salmon, tuna and yellowtail - no sign of any toro) And to achieve this in the middle of the desert!"^^ . "7"^^ . . . . "5"^^ . "2009-03-15T00:00:00"^^ .