Totomaru shatters our expectations, but can they win our hearts?

In Japan, kaitenzushi/conveyor belt sushi chains tend to be a little more creative and less bound by tradition than more formal sushi restaurants. Even still, our Japanese-language reporter Natsuno Futon was immensely startled, yet incredibly intrigued, by what she saw at a kaitenzushi restaurant during her recent trip back to her hometown in Gifu Prefecture.

Totomaru is a local chain with about two dozen branches, mostly in Aichi Prefecture but also with locations in Gifu and Shizuoka. They’ve got a reputation for outstanding freshness and flavor, so Natsuno always makes a point of eating there at least once when she’s back home visiting friends and family.

Staring off with some more or less standard fish, everything was as delicious as Natsuo remembered it being. Since this was her first visit in a while, though, she decided to also peruse the menu of limited-time summer dishes, such as the seared salmon with mirin lees and yuzu zest, which was both original and outstanding.

At one point, the sound of a taiko drum rang out, signaling the start of a warayaki cooking session. Warayaki is a style of cooking in which rice straw is burned to produce intense flames, over which katsuo (bonito) is seared.

But as attention-grabbing as the warayaki performance was, it still didn’t match the eyeball-pulling power of this menu item which had Natsuno asking…

…wait, is that ice cream cone sushi!?!

Yes, that really is minced tuna scooped into the cone, and not some sort of strawberry or peach ice cream. However, since the actual criteria for something to be sushi is the presence of vinegared rice, it’d be more accurate to call this ice cream cone sashimi, since the cone has no rice inside.

Whether sushi or sashimi, though, Natsuno knew that she had to try this, so she punched in an order for it on her table’s tablet.

As odd as it looked in the menu photos, it was even more surreal to have it standing on the table.

So…why? Because this is Totomaru’s unorthodox take on yukke, which is itself Japan’s riff on Korean cuisine’s yukhoe. In sushi restaurants, yukke refers to minced tuna served with raw egg yolk, negi (green onion), and shiso (Japanese basil). Instead of serving it in a bowl like most restaurants do, though, Totomaru brings it to you in a waffle cone for the 319-yen (US$2.15) Yukke Crush, as they call it.

You do still get a plate, though, because the restaurant’s recommended way to eat the Yukke Crush is first to tip the cone over…

…pour out the contents and make sure all the egg drizzles out…

…and then crush the cone with a spoon.

▼ Ah, sorry, we mean “crush!” the cone with a spoon.

It’s up to you how thoroughly you want to pulverize the cone, depending on your desired texture, or perhaps how much pent-up stress you have at the moment.

So how does it taste? Not bad. Honestly, with such an unusual guest ingredient, it wouldn’t have been shocking if the Yukke Crush had turned out completely inedible. Maybe, though, because yukke itself is already a dish with a lot of strong, stimulating flavors, adding one more, even one as unexpected as this, can’t completely derail it.

It was noticeably sweeter than normal yukke, though. Without the presence of vinegared sushi rice (which has a touch of sweetness to it), yukke doesn’t ordinarily light up too many of your sweet flavor receptors, and while the waffle cone wasn’t sweet enough to qualify as a dessert without any ice cream in it, Natsuno’s taste buds told her right away that this wasn’t any ordinary yukke.

On this day, Natsuno wasn’t completely won over by the Yukke Crush, but she wouldn’t advise anyone to avoid it either. With its deviations from the yukke norm, we can probably say that this is an acquired taste, and if it’s one you’re interested in acquiring, it’s worth a shot, and even if you don’t immediately fall in love with it, you’ll probably never forget it either.

Related: Totomaru location list
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