Boston News Today - VILLAGE SUSHI & GRILL

Plenty of good sushi spots can be found in the Greater Boston area, including some very good names such as Oishii, Haru, O Ya, Uni, and Douzo, but there are also a lot of terrific sushi bars that aren’t very well known (and in many cases, a lot cheaper than some of the popular spots). The serene and laid-back Village Sushi & Grill in the heart of Roslindale Village is one such place, and it also comes with a bonus—a hidden brick patio that’s shared with two other eateries and is a perfect place to do a whole lot of nothing (other than eating and drinking) on a warm summer night.

Village Sushi & Grill is one of a number of great dining options in Roslindale Village, which is a bit of a hidden gem in and of itself, perhaps because it’s a good six or seven miles from downtown Boston and isn’t as easy to get to via public transportation as, say, Dorchester or Brighton. (The Orange Line ends about a mile and a half short of Rozzie, though the commuter rail does make a stop there.) It’s easy to miss the restaurant because the outside of the place blends into the rest of the commercial strip on Corinth Street with its unassuming storefront and sign. The interior of Village Sushi feels almost like a wellness spa rather than a restaurant with its soft background music, heavy use of blond woods, and traditional Japanese lights, while the setup is a familiar one with the sushi bar that has a few chairs on one side of the main room and a handful of tables mostly on the other side, as well as more tables in the front by the windows. If you continue to the back of the eatery (or walk down the narrow alley off Birch Street around the corner), you’ll find the aforementioned patio, whose space is shared with Sophia’s Grotto and Birch Street Bistro—and which is enclosed enough to keep much of the wind out even on the most breezy days.

As is the case with many sushi bars, Village Sushi & Grill offers Japanese appetizers, noodle dishes, grill items, and more in addition to sushi, but the place also has a number of Korean options as well. Non-sushi highlights are many here, including juicy steamed gyoza with pork, wasabi shumai that will quickly clear up any allergies you have, a savory beef dumpling soup with clear potato noodles, a briny and earthy seaweed salad with vinegar and sesame oil, chicken katsu with lightly battered white meat, a zesty and rich salmon teriyaki, udon noodle soup with seafood in a spicy broth, mandoo kuk (a full-sized Korean soup with beef dumplings), and a sizzling bibimbop in a traditional hot stone pot with meat, veggies, and a fried egg. Sushi options at Village Sushi include a tremendous Las Vegas maki (crab meat, cucumber, avocado, and cream cheese with spicy tuna with mayo and tobiko on top) and an equally impressive crazy maki (shrimp tempura maki, spicy tuna, tempura flakes), along with terrific versions of spicy tuna katsu maki, ikura (salmon roe), crab stick roll, sweet potato tempura, and for group dining, a “Village Sushi Boat” with 44 pieces of sushi and maki. There aren’t too many surprises among the drink listings at Village Sushi, with Asian beers and plum wine being two options, while sake and sake-based offerings include a saketini that is well worth getting—but they sneak up on you, so one is probably plenty unless you’re walking home (or a passenger in the car).

While by no means a household name among Asian restaurants in and around Boston, Village Sushi & Grill is consistently a very pleasant option for Asian fare, as its friendly service, decent prices, quiet indoor dining area, secret-feeling patio, lack of crowds, and relatively easy street parking out front make this a great alternative to some of the more popular sushi bars and Japanese eateries in the region. Roslindale tends to be an underrated neighborhood for dining, and Village Sushi is certainly an underrated—and underappreciated—spot that deserves a look.

VILLAGE SUSHI & GRILL. 14 CORINTH ST., ROSLINDALE. VILLAGESUSHIANDGRILL.COM

MARC HURWITZ

Marc is the founder of @hiddenboston, a textbook editor, a hike leader for @AppMtnClub, and a food and travel writer and commenter for DigBoston, NBC/NECN, WBZ, WMFO and indie617.