LITTLE ROCK — In a business so capricious that dedicated cupcake patisseries outperform the neighborhood bar and grill, sometimes a restaurant can rock steady even as an entire eating landscape shifts around it.
When Igibon Japanese Food House opened in 1998, such fare (sushi, specifically) wasn’t the tip-of the-tongue alternative to grilled chicken salad lunches that it is in central Arkansas today. Oh, maybe on the coasts - maybe in Dallas - but here in Flyover Country, we wrinkled our noses at the suggestion of eating raw fish.
Such was the climate when Eva Chen opened her restaurant. There was already Mt. Fuji, and some wondered aloud whether two Japanese places might cannibalize what precious few patrons they might entice. (I’m looking across a row of desks at you, Mr. Eric Harrison.)
Certainly the prescient voices predicting a wave of sushi bars were barely audible. But today a Little Rocker can pick up fresh sushi and a nice seaweed salad in any one of the city’s Krogers.
So this summer when Igibon changed hands, some folks may have asked themselves if it would survive the near future - not because its menu is too foreign, but quite the opposite, because it has become nothing special.
The Igibon regulars who made the leap along with new owner Batulzii “Crystal” Bataa, a native Mongolian, should be pleased. The service is as solicitous as ever, and the menu is just the same.
“No,” said my date. “They changed the mussels and clam roll.”
Oh, she was crestfallen. Once upon a time, you see, there was a certain kindly regular at a certain Heights bread company who would bring in these delicious mussels and clam rolls. They were from Igibon, the before Igibon, and they were wrapped in rice flour sheets. Now, she said, they come bound in simple seaweed.
I didn’t ask why someone would cart in food from one restaurant to feed the employees of another. The memory was just too sweet to confront.
Inside, she asked for this very thing, exactly as she wanted it, and the waitress winced. Rice paper is very delicate, she said. Oh, it’s true, said my date, but she’d had it before.
Wouldn’t you know but that “itamae” made it work, and it was the highlight of the dinner!
The vertical roll ($2.50) of rice topped with chopped mussel and clam meat bound by a tangy dressing and sprinkled with flying fish roe arrived beautifully wrapped, the ends tucked - a chewy, tortilla-textured thing inviting us to drop our chopsticks andpick it up.
It was all as she wanted.
The restaurant offers at least a half dozen different kinds of meals, each with several variations. Along with sushi and sashimi (thinly sliced fish unfettered by rice and seaweed), there are:
Tempura ($8-$1 5. 50) - lightly battered and fried pieces of shrimp and vegetables
Teriyaki ($9-$14)- think Japanese barbecue
Udon ($7-$8.50) - Japanese noodles, served typically as a soup
Domburimono ($7-$8) - Japanese rice bowl, served with meat and egg.
The salmon teriyaki ($14) was nicely prepared, while the octopus and cucumber salad ($5) was tentaclicious.The nabeyaki udon ($8.50), with its chunky melange of beef and faux crabmeat, chicken and shrimp and egg, steeped in a vegetable stock with thick fresh noodles, is the hungry man’s delight on a cold, gray day.
The gyoza ($4), pan-fried dumplings stuffed with pork, were cooked to perfection - a uniformly crisp exterior belying a soft and steaming ground pork middle.
The tempura, alas, is no better than at Panda buffet. Neither light nor crunchy, Igibon’s whack at the pan-Asian batter makes of vegetables a sort of deep-fried dumpling reminiscent of something Spago chef Lee Hefter told the L.A. Times - “It’s amazing how many people will go their whole lives thinking they’ve had tempura.”
The hot sake ($4) is only slightly more expensive than its weight in green tea. As are the Kirin Ichiban, Sapporo and Heineken ($3.50) beers, and the Bud Lite ($2.50).
After nearly half a year, Bataa has not ushered in a new Igibon era, much to our relief. Entrenched in the protean Market Place Shopping Center, foxhole buddies for now with Catherine & Co. Hair and Color Design and a Summit bank branch, she aims to keep the sushi rolling. We wish her well.
Igibon Japanese Food House Address: 11121 N. Rodney Parham Road (Market Place Shopping Center), Little Rock Hours: 11 a.m.-2:30 p.m., 5-10 p.m. Monday-Saturday Cuisine: Japanese Credit cards: MC, V, AE, D Alcoholic beverages: Beer, wine, sake Reservations: Yes Wheelchair accessible: Yes Carryout: Yes (501) 217-8888
Weekend, Pages 41 on 11/25/2010