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Japanese restaurant Ukai Sushi, 39 Lavender Hill, Battersea, London

May 9th, 2009 by Olivier

Ukai Sushi
39 Lavender Hill, Battersea
SW11 5 London
0207 350 2565

Reviewed on Saturday 9 May lunch time

We discovered Ukai Sushi really by luck. Today we first wanted to try the Franco Manca pizzeria in Brixton Market since it gets so many good reviews. Despite getting there at 12:30 there was an umbelievable queue at the pizzeria! Even the best pizza in the world is not worth wasting our time in a queue so we decided to go to look for a restaurant around Clapham Common. While trying to find a restaurant we saw a butcher cooking sausages on a BBQ in the street. They looked good so we tried them. Big mistake! They were greasy and the bread dry. Also, the guy serving us was using gloves but he handled the money and other things whilst keeping his gloves on. Lovely sense of hygiene…

Greasy award winning sausages

They looked good...

... but they were awfully salty and greasy, the grease going through the paper

Well, after finding a bin for getting rid of that 1000 calorie sausage we were looking for a nice light lunch and on our way to Clapham Junction we found Ukai Sushi. Ukai Sushi has a nice sober and modern decoration all in black. Seats are large cubes. The only downside was that you can’t put your feet under, and have no support for your back – so no relaxing back in your seat. We ordered a spicy tuna platter and a spicy salmon platter and for drink it was a kiwi + mint iced tea and a golden lotus with jadeli tea.

The spicy tuna and salmon were indeed spicy, and everything was good quality and fresh. Both were a mix of sashimi (4 slices), nagiri sushi (2 pieces) and hosomaki sushi (5 pieces) – respectively with tuna in one case, and salmon in the other. We would have preferred the sashimi to be a bit colder, but no complaints beyond that. Another general observaton is that the entire platter being tuna (or slamon) can get a little boring even if its spicy, and we shared – so another time we would probably choose a selection of different sushi.

The golden lotus tea was excellent. The only complaint to make about it is the type of glass it is served in – which gets very hot and can burn your fingers. A balloon glass or one with a handle would be much better for the customer. The kiwi/mint iced tea was very good, and freshly made. Not the easiest thing to drink with a straw though, as the bits of kiwi tended to block it.