An Expansive Setting for Enjoying Some Tasty Sushi

Everyone who loves sushi in L.A. has fond memories of Katsu, the seminal sushi restaurant on Hillhurst in Los Feliz, which was sold a couple of years ago. Since then, if you wanted a sushi fix from Katsu, its founder and chef, you had to go to his modest Katsu on 3rd, just across from Cedars-Sinai, a good address to keep in mind if you want to bring in some food for a friend in the hospital.

Now, however, he’s opened a more ambitious place in Studio City. For five years he’d scoured the Westside for the right space with no luck. When a friend showed him a free-standing building on Ventura Boulevard--with its own parking lot, no less--he jumped.

Open for lunch and dinner, Restaurant Katsu is a sleek contemporary space with pale hardwood chairs, and decorated with wood and bamboo. You can sit in the main dining room, at a long communal table, or at one of two sushi bars. The second, in a room apart, is where Katsu offers omakase, or chef’s choice. Reservations are recommended.

The master sushi chef looks as if he’s having a good time here, grating fresh wasabi root over a fine-nibbed metal grater, cutting thin slices of yellowtail or toro with a beautiful Japanese knife, or peeling white peaches for a dessert of fresh fruit. The fish is pristinely fresh, the rice pearly with each grain standing separate. And what a luxury to just sit back and let him choose for you.

One summer starter I loved at a recent meal there was a slurry of gelatinous brownish-green seaweed with mountain yam grated over, which has an amazing slimy texture. He put both in a bowl with some slices of slender chile. The idea is to stir it up with your chopsticks and drink. It’s no stranger than an oyster shooter and a lot more delicious. He also made a lovely salad of julienned carrots, cucumber and daikon with small pieces of tempura-fried halibut on top, which played warm against cool to good effect. Needless to say, his straightforward sushi, slices of yellowtail or toro or fresh sardine draped over an oval of rice, is top-notch.

At lunch, he offers assorted sushi or sashimi plates, combinations of two items with rice and miso soup at $12, and a la carte items, such as his crispy grilled salmon skin salad or grilled butterfish marinated in sake and miso.

Go. Enjoy.

BE THERE

Restaurant Katsu, 11920 Ventura Blvd., Studio City; (818) 760-4585. Open Mondays to Fridays for lunch, daily for dinner. Sushi $4 to $20; omakase (chef’s choice) sushi $70 per person and up. Valet parking.