In the Chicago suburbs on a recent trip to the area, I decided that I really needed some sushi one evening. I wanted to try some place new and a place in Park Ridge caught my eye as I was driving by it a few weeks before - Shakou. I decided to give the place a try, and then when I got there and got settled in, I realized that I had already eaten at a Shakou location before this.
I had eaten at the Shakou in St. Charles about about four years ago with a dealer of mine and his wife and I had thought it was very good. (Click here to see that visit to the St. Charles Shakou.) The first Shakou opened in far north suburban Libertyville in 2013 by a small group of people who lived there - Ed Hartigan, Aleks Dupor and his wife, Chrissy, and Adam Garvanian. Aleks Dupor and Garvanian both had extensive histories in the restaurant business and had been friends for over 20 years before going in together - along with Dupor's wife, Chrissy - and coaxing their friend Hartigan out of the investment banking business to start the first Shakou in downtown Libertyville. The second Shakou opened in St. Charles in April of 2015 and a third location in the far northwestern suburb of Barrington opened in October of that year. The Park Ridge Shakou opened just over a year ago in late June of 2016.
The decor is similar to the one out in St. Charles - a distinctive modern style with blue accent lights along the long wall and under that long bar that split from a regular bar to a sushi bar. Unique lighting arrangements hung from the middle of the room with small Edison-style bulbs inside small glass lamps hanging above the bar. Contemporary art work also was hung on the walls throughout the place.
I took a seat at the sushi bar and asked my server for a bottle of Asahi. They don't have Asahi at Shakou - something that I sort of remembered from my first visit to the St. Charles location. I ended up getting a bottle of Sapporo instead.
For starters, I went with a couple rolls each of spicy salmon and spicy tuna. The rolls were somewhat large, but there were only five thin cut rolls with adequate amounts of ground salmon and tuna in each roll. The spicy mixture was mixed in with the salmon and tuna rather than using a spicy sauce on top. Both spicy rolls were very good, but I liked the taste and the consistency of the spicy tuna roll better.
For sushi, well, I probably went overboard. I ended up getting two pieces of Blue Fin tuna that they had that evening at a market price. I also got two pieces each of sake (salmon) and hamachi (yellow tail), and four pieces of the smoked salmon. Overboard, in that it was a lot of fish - the cuts were very large - and it was also expensive. The Blue Fin tuna was outstanding with a fatty taste and chewy consistency. The yellow tail was just all right as it was a bit fishy in taste, but the salmon - and especially the smoked salmon - was very good. The smoked salmon had a great smoky taste and it was firm and full-bodied. But I was completely stuffed by the end of the meal.
Sometimes I forget the names of places I've eaten at in the past, but I wasn't disappointed in finding - and trying - the newest Shakou in Park Ridge. Like the location I've eaten at in St. Charles, this Shakou had good spicy rolls and very good to outstanding sushi. The contemporary decor was similar to the St. Charles location, and the service was impeccable. My only caveat was that it was rather expensive for all that I got. Other than that, I have no complaints for my visit to Shakou in Park Ridge.
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