Masu Izakaya

It's a little weird sitting at the corner of Armitage and Halsted, looking at a menu that includes both grilled chicken hearts and grilled chicken livers.

Masu, it would seem, is the closest thing we have to a real izakaya within Chicago city limits. There is a good sized sushi menu, but most of the action is on small plates (most of which are cooked).

I walked into Masu shortly before 6 to a completely empty restaurant, but fortunately more people arrived as I ate because this place deserves to succeed. They are doing some pretty fantastic stuff in an unexpected part of the city for this kind of food.

I started off with an order of seared shishito peppers (with soy and mirin) and what's listed on the menu as "tuna tuna". Tuna tuna is a plate of large chunks of raw tuna and raw chunks of avocado served in a citrus shoyo. Both the tuna and avocado tasted fresh and the textures worked well with each other, even if the size of the chunks made this a little hard to eat. The shisito peppers were spicy, but also had a deep savory flavor. I liked them but couldn't finish a whole plate's worth.

My next dish was the absolute star of the show. Salt grilled mackerel. Better than Ginza. Just as good as Sunshine Cafe. Seriously. This grilled mackeral is absolutely the equal of the brilliant version served up in Andersonville. Served piping hot, the flesh was moist, the skin was crisp, the fish was oozing oil and had that perfectly fishy flavor that's so attractive in this style of mackerel. I can't tell you how happy eating this dish made me. It's a small serving, but at $8 it's not meant to be a true main course. I would go back to Masu for this dish alone.

I finished off with a couple of items from the grilled section of the menu. I had a skewer of salt grilled chicken skin, which was light and flavorful, and the charcoal grilled beef. The beef was served sliced, and had a nice flavor/char on the outside, but several pieces were cooked a bit more than I otherwise would have preferred.

All of this cost me $40 after tax but before tip and was a pretty good amount of food. Service was friendly, but clearly geared towards the neighborhood (the explanation of the very extensive menu started with edamame and miso soup...it took a while to get to the good stuff). Liquor license is pending so they are BYO for now. It looks like they will have a handful of beers on tap, along with sake and wine.

I definitely plan on returning to make my way through more of the menu. This place is a gem, and a very positive addition to Lincoln Park.

Masu Izakaya
1969 N Halsted St
Chicago IL60614

Josh,

That's great news, and thanks for checking the place out. I had dinner a few weeks ago next door to Masu Isakaya at La Tratorria del Merlo, another underheralded place. The wife and child of Masu Izakaya's chef/ owner were at the only other occupied table, and it was clear from a brief chat with them that establishing the restaurant was a true labor of love.

KZ

A good reminder for me to get back to Tratorria del Merlo. I enjoyed my only visit, but that was about a year ago.

jesteinf wrote:This grilled mackeral is absolutely the equal of the brilliant version served up in Andersonville

Quite an endorsement, though you had me at salt grilled chicken skin. Masu Izakaya just jumped to the top of my list.

Place is very comforting, very good. One of the few Japanese restaurants actually serving Japanese food. Back room is painfully loud, however.

I worked @ Izakaya Hiwatta in Ichinomia Japan. Been looking for a good Izakaya closer to home. So far, that's NY and Portland Or. Must try. Dare I hope for Ayu or fried ginko nuts?

Jazzfood wrote:I worked @ Izakaya Hiwatta in Ichinomia Japan. Been looking for a good Izakaya closer to home. So far, that's NY and Portland Or. Must try. Dare I hope for Ayu or fried ginko nuts?

No on both as far as I can remember.

Was just around the corner the other day and dropped in for a second. Interesting place. Thanks for the report. By the way, I think the juxtaposition between a Japanese booze/snack place and the surrounding 'hood is somehow "authentic." These kinds of places are similarly situated in NY, for example. (Has more to do with where the Japanese bankers are/were, but still.)

It's not so much the type of restaurant it is, but what they're serving. Sort of like Purple Pig serving bone marrow across the street from Bandera.

Right, but that type of restaurant (izakaya) serves that type of food. Good parallel with the Purple Pig. You think of places like that on Fulton or in Westown, not on the Mag Mile.

I ate there with my wife and another couple 2 weeks ago, and we had a really great meal overall. I have not really eaten at a true izakaya previously, but I certainly would go to more if they are all like this restaurant.

We had a table in the front, which was right by the door, but perhaps better than the very noisy back room, at least if you plan on holding a conversation. Currently it is BYOB, so we brought a bottle of decent sake and some beer, and the hostess was more than helpful in getting glasses and keeping the beers cold in the back.

We ordered a ton of food, but somewhat broken up, so things came at a nice pace. Some of the things I remember are: hamachi with jalapeno (with a ponzu sauce - refreshing but nothing spectacular), Tuna Tuna (cubed tuna and avocado, which was very fresh tasting), mixed tempura (shrimp, lotus root, Japanese pumpkin, all of which had a light batter which was not greasy), kakuri katsu (panko-breaded pork belly, which was nice but I should have tried the braised pork belly dish), yakitori of beef short-rib and chicken heart (the chicken heart was one of my favorite dishes, just bursting with a deep meatiness), grilled hamachi collar (another of my favorites, with perfectly moist and flavorful fish hidden between bones and lightly dusted with salt), oyako don (chopped chicken with egg and a sweet dashi sauce over rice; it was a really, really nicely composed comfort food dish), and the "red dragon" roll (spicy shrimp, sliced tuna, unagi sauce - definitely not their strongpoint).

All of that food, and the total came to $120 without tip! $30 a person for all of that food, and some really good food no less. I think there may have even been a mistake in the bill, but I never had the chance to actually look at it closely, so I will just accept that it was a great meal for a really good price.

I would certainly go back again, so if anyone is looking for a good Japanese pub food place, this is the one to go to around here, at least for now (I think there are some others opening up very soon as well).

http://www.masuchicago.com

I enjoyed Michael Nagrant's online review of Masu Izakaya, though I think Jeffrey Steingarten deserves the credit for the "Toro, Toro, Toro" bit.

Katie wrote:I enjoyed Michael Nagrant's online review of Masu Izakaya...

Michael Nagrant wrote:Masu is not exactly a traditional izakaya. It’s still hedging its bets with a simple, though comprehensive sushi menu and, as our server mentioned, if we wanted some of those “crazy complicated” rolls everyone else makes, they could accommodate. Who can blame them? Most of the folks living within a few square miles probably think an izakaya is a new type of crotch-rocket motorcycle.

Thank goodness for Michael Nagrant.

2nd dinner at Masu tonight and this place continues to excite me. They now have their liquor license. Beer and wine were available tonight, with sake arriving tomorrow.

I had 5 dishes, 3 of which were real standouts:

Agedashi tofu - light as air with a very tasty broth
Braised pork belly - the belly itself is fine, but the dish is elevated by a schmear of spicy mustard on the side of the bowl that compliments the belly perfectly
Grilled hamachi collar - I was sort of on the fence with this one as my first bite had a bit of skin that was more rubbery than crispy. Once I got past that though I very much enjoyed myself picking the moist, light, sweet fish from the bone. The rest of the skin had a great texture and was just slightly salty. It's a tough call deciding if I like the hamachi collar or the mackerel more...I recommend ordering both.

Made it into Masu last night. It was only half full but between the acoustics and the fairly loud music we found ourselves almost yelling across the table. The front area was empty when we got there but full when we left, and the crowd seemed to be having a good time, so next time I think we'll opt for the front.

It's obvious Masu feels like they have to offer sushi to be viable in the location. Most tables ordered a large plate of sushi and the waiter made it a point that even though they only offer five special rolls on the menu, the kitchen can make just about anything on request. I guess some people have been disappointed that the special roll menu isn't more extensive. Also as I was walking in I saw a couple looking over the menu posted on the door. They remarked that the sushi list wasn't broad enough so they left. It's a shame because I have to say the raw fish items on the menu were the least impressive of the night.

We started off with a couple cold items from the izakaya menu. The tuna tuna salad had a nice citrus dressing but the chunks of tuna were a little big and stringy. The burndock root salad (kimpiri I think) tasted like it came out of a can, which isn't to say it tasted bad, just not that fresh. The best of the three was the jalapeno hamachi. The raw hamachi was sliced thin and complemented the sliced jalapenos and the tart dressing pretty well. At that point in the meal we were thinking, mediocre sushi with citrus dressing.

Then the warm dishes started to come. My two favorites were the agedashi tofu and the tonkatsu. The tofu was silky smooth and served in a delicious and sweet broth with plenty of those small, flavorful mushrooms. The tonkatsu was nice and crispy. The breading was thick so you could taste it next to the fatty pork belly. We also got a couple of the yakitori. The chicken hearts were tender though the sauce was a little sweeter than I'd have preferred. The chicken skin was very flavorful particularly when dipped in salt and spritzed with lemon. We finished off with one of the aforementioned grilled mackerels. I love mackerel in general and this was as good as others I've enjoyed.

The dishes came out pretty quickly which we really appreciated. The portions are on the small side so if you're with more than two people you might get no more than two bites of each dish. I'd be more excited about the restaurant if the menu featured a wider range of cooked izakaya options. I understand that they have to offer sushi simply because that's what people know, but in a sea of sushi restaurants they really didn't stand out. It's great that Chicago now has an izakaya option, but their focus is clearly split between so-so sushi and pretty good izakaya.

Quick comment: We had dinner at Masu Izakaya...I'll definitely return. I haven't eaten at an authentic izakaya in Japan, but I loved the food because it was reminiscent of more traditional Japanese places in Chicago like Matsuya, Ito, Sunshine, etc. If you want sushi, you'll find it, but you're doing yourself a disservice if you don't sample some of the non-sushi dishes that make this place worth a visit.

We sat in the back. About 5 other tables were occupied. Noise, which has been mentioned in several reviews, was not a factor.

I look forward to Chizakaya opening on Lincoln. Hopefully ramen joints will soon follow. I would love to walk into a small ramen joint and witnesing someone passionately stiring their heart and soul into a hearty broth.

Our dinner at Masu on Saturday night won't motivate us to rush back. It was definitely a mixed experience. On the positive side, the openers (edamame and shishito peppers) and mains (una don and sake chazuke) were satisfying. In particular, it would be wonderful to start any meal with the salty heat of shishito. But then the "tuna tuna", chunks of avocado and tuna with a citrusy dressing, was disappointing. It seems like cutting the tuna into such hulky cubes isn't playing to its strengths. You'd take a bite, enjoy the bright flavor, savor the avocado melting in your mouth, and then realize that you still had work to do to break down the tuna. On the other hand, the chicken thigh on the negima yakitori was cut too small. Shriveled bits of chicken were clinging to the skewers under the weight of the laquered-on sauce. From our taste, the tsukune yakitori and gyoza both suffered from too much aromatic ginger, overwhelming both the chicken and pork, respectively. The service we received was attentive and friendly. But it just seems like some more attention to detail would make for marked improvement.

Per firsthand reports including Steve Dolinsky, Masu's run has ended. Iza crying shame.