Love boats
A’Float’s tasty, affordable and healthy sushi armada scuttles the competition
By Dan O'Heron 07/15/2010
A’Float Sushi in Old Pasadena features an actual fleet of 25 hand-carved, brass-fitted boats that resemble luxury liners on a sea of plenty when laden with visual sensations of sushi and sashimi.
Ships sail on a current of water in a stainless-steel channel around an elongated oblong sushi bar. In the swim, created by pulses from unseen pipes beneath the channel, a steady onward flow propels the crafts, which are all linked by gold chains.
Reminiscent of a miniature Rose Parade on water, the deck of each float typically shows off such fare as blowtorch-seared tuna tataki, mini lobster, colorful seaweed salad, glistening salmon, eel, squid and glittering pebbles of salmon roe. Of course, they also overflow with every imaginable type of seafood — from jellyfish to yellowtail and sea urchin (scooped out of its pincushion shell and eaten raw) to baked scallop with mushrooms and onions.
Each patron picks an item as it comes around, or gives it the eye and waits until it comes around again, or just ignores it completely in the 2 ½ minutes it takes a boat to make it back around.
How long, on average, is it before an item is fully “deboarded?” I asked a waitress attending the needs of patrons on shore: “This is Wednesday. Do any of the dishes remain on deck until Saturday?”
As if addressing a child, “No, no, no,” she exclaimed. Throwing up her hands in dismay, she indicated that everything is fresh off the boat. If a dish isn’t gone in 30 minutes, it’s taken out of the lineup.
But perhaps the best part of the A’Float dining experience is not just the first-rate food, but the first-cabin service, all at steerage prices. Each of six artfully designed plates, bearing from two to six pieces of a la carte sushi on each plate, is color-coded to indicate prices of $1.98, $2.58, $3.08, $3.58, $4.09 and $6.15. Your bill is determined by number and color of plates used.
In front of each guest as they sit down is an illustrated menu/place mat where all that information can be found. The menu includes symbols that indicate whether the dish is raw, partially cooked or all-vegetable. The menu also includes specialties, side dishes, desserts and beverages, prepared in a rear kitchen and served at the sushi bar by the waitress.
Among kitchen features are lacquered wooden bento boxes, compartmented to hold up to eight pieces of sashimi for $6.15 (served all day), or variegated with eight items (both sushi and non-sushi) at lunch for $6.95. If covered with felt, they would be pretty enough to snuggle jewels. As they are, the actual pick of the lunchtime glitter might be the shrimp, shrimp tempura, salad, soup, rice and three California rolls for only $7.95
Visiting the restaurant recently, I discovered that in a price war among other sushi purveyors — with or without fancy conveyances — A’Float’s armada scuttles the opposition.
Ushered to a seat at the helm of the voyager, my dining partner and I watched the main sushi chef cut and press small folds of shimmering seafood into delicate rice and seaweed wraps. We shared a four-piece plate of a crabmeat avocado roll, wrapped in a raspy-textured tempura coating; a plate of audibly crisp, sweet, earthy burdock root; a four-piece shrimp and avocado tiger roll; a four-piece vegetable roll and a two-piece baked salmon. All of that, plus two cups of hot, green tea with refills, came to a total of only $14!
I relished the taste of everything except the salmon. It was sticky and cloyed of sweetness. My partner agreed — since people always agree with the person paying the bill. I must admit, however, she took her piece down to the last candied shred.
I expected my partner, on her maiden sushi voyage, would be a little queasy over the whole experience. I cautioned her not to use to much wasabi, as it “would cloak the flavors the chef has taken such pains to procure.”
She just nodded and kept on eating everything in sight.
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