Real Sushi at Hamashi Kita in Halifax

We've eaten sushi before but it usually comes from the supermarket and isn't really closely related to raw fish sushi. These tend to be made with vegetables or fake crab. To our delight, a little day trip to Halifax gave us the opportunity to taste real sushi for the first time.

My girlfriend is warming up to raw food and such previously yucky stuff like salmon roe. I even tested her readiness by ordering a unagi maki roll which contains grilled eel. We've never eaten eel before and to tell you the truth, a slimy aquatic snake-like creature doesn't really wet my appetite. But it was good. The fish wasn't really distinct but it was still good.

For our main course, my girlfriend and I shared the assorted maki combination and the assorted sushi combination (the restaurant's full menu is available through http://www.hydrostonemarket.ca/Foodpages/sushi.html or at http://www.hamachihouse.com/). In addition to containing raw red snapper, tuna and salmon, these rolls had some nice crunchy stuff - possibly panko - delicious nori and all sorts of other good things. This was certainly a treat for the foodies in us. But it's even better when you consider how healthy sushi is. And the exquisitely crisp Asahi beer certainly helped alot.

The restaurant itself is nice and small, situated in the quaint Hydrotone Market on Young Street in Halifax. There are a small bunch of really nice locally owned shops that make block stores look like the consumer cattle houses that they are. And peppered through these shops are restaurants (we also visited the Spring Garden Road shopping district which is also really nice and refreshing). Everyone in the stores, even young shop clerks, were kind and helpful which certainly includes our waiter who was helpful, non-intrusive and always right on cue.

All in all, Hamashi Kita has made it into my repertoire of "restaurants I like and will always go back to" or in layman's terms, a 10 out of 10.