Sake Tumi is one of Milwaukee’s best known sushi restaurants. Nestled amongst the clubs on the East side of Milwaukee St, between Mason and Wisconsin Ave, Sake Tumi has an elegance and sophistication befitting its downtown location. Best known as a post-work or pre-club dinner option, I decided to break the mold and take a date there for lunch.

We were seated quickly upon entering the dining area. We ordered a pot of hot tea and began perusing the lunch menu. To start, we ordered some edamame and the Vietnamese crispy crab cake. For our entrées she ordered the maki lunch combo, which came with 3 lunch rolls and, being vegetarian, she ordered the avocado, sweet potato and futo rolls. I ordered the sushi bento box. This bento box came with 4 pieces of sashimi, 3 pieces of nigiri, 2 pieces of inari, hiyashi wakame and a chef’s choice maki. As if that wasn’t enough, we also decided to try a half size Hawaiian specialty roll. This monster of a roll is tempura white fish, avocado, cream cheese, adobo peanuts, scallions and green tea garlic miso sauce topped with a pineapple cilantro relish.

We didn’t have to wait long before the food arrived. The first on the table was the edamame. Not long after that, our crab cake arrived. I’m not going to lie, I was a bit surprised to see that it was indeed a crab cake … singular, as in one. Thankfully it was big. Perhaps not $9 big, but big nonetheless. Another problem I had with this dish was the lack of forks. I’m no novice at eating with chopsticks; however, sharing a soft, flaky crab cake with a date using only chopsticks is not so easy. Despite the initial disappointments, the cake was delicious. We couldn’t get enough of the sauce, and the consistency of the cake was perfect.

Just as we finished our crab cake, the entrées arrived, along with our Hawaiian roll. We both had problems with the rice used in the rolls and nigiri. It was overcooked and made eating the sushi less enjoyable. Despite this, my date enjoyed her avocado and futo rolls, but did complain that her sweet potato roll didn’t have enough flavor to overcome the rice. I simply took the fish off the rice of the nigiri and ate it sashimi style. The inari was absolutely phenomenal, and the hiyashi wakame was a nice neutral balance to all the flavors. I was a little disappointed to discover that the “chef’s choice” sushi roll was an ordinary California roll. I guess sometimes it’s best to play it safe. Overall, the entrées were simply OK.

The Hawaiian roll was, in a word, formidable. Sake Tumi scored once again with the flavors on this monster, but eating it was a challenge. While there is nothing sexier than watching your date attempt to shove a 3-inch diameter sushi roll smothered in sauce into her mouth, this dish would have benefited from more bite-sized pieces. The structural integrity of this roll made it difficult to take bites out of it without the whole thing falling apart. This is another example of when a fork would have been preferred. That aside, this dish was still our favorite part of the meal.

After lunch, we ordered some cocktails. After quizzing the waiter as to the house specialty, I settle on the Saketini – muddled lime and sugar, Ozeki dry sake and vodka. It was so good that, in true Alcoholmanac fashion, I ordered three more: The Geisha – plum wine and dry sake, the Lychee Martini – lychee juice, simple syrup, vodka and Ozeki dry sake, and the Mangotini – mango puree, mango vodka, mango rum and pineapple juice. Editor’s Note: Sake Tumi has made some recipe and price changes to their drink menu since the time of this review.

We left very full, overall pleased, a little buzzed and with lighter wallets. It should be noted that lunch can be had for less than $10 per person. No reasonable human should ever order the amount we ordered that day. Also of note, Sake Tumi offers a lunch roll special that can be ready in less than 5 minutes for the busy professional. Our lunch took almost 2 hours …