Nomikai: A New ICON Park Restaurant that Already Needs Improvement

We got the hamachi truffle potato appetizer, which is very similar to something I’ve had at Sushi Izuki. Small slices of hamachi wrapped around potato strings, giving a nice contrast of textures between the crisp potato and the soft, fresh fish. There wasn’t much truffle flavor though, more just the taste of fish and potato chips.

The components here are fresh, and the fish complements the creamy, soft avocado well. The little crunch from the tempura flakes adds texture, but this roll was bland on its own without dipping it into some soy sauce.

I usually don’t order steaks very often at restaurants since I find them all pretty similar across dining establishments, and this didn’t change that mindset. It’s a solid steak but nothing special. The koji, which is cultured rice grains, doesn’t really add flavor or complexity to the steak but does help tenderize it. The steak was well cooked, and the fries were surprisingly crispy despite how dry and stale they looked on the plate. I didn’t like the béarnaise sauce it came with though, I found it overpowering in its sourness, almost like a creamy A1 sauce, and couldn’t taste much else when dipping the meat into it.

This was the menu item that drew me into the restaurant, and it was a huge letdown. It didn’t have much lobster flavor whatsoever in the actual pasta sauce, this could have been any regular cream based pasta sauce. There also wasn’t much mentaiko flavor, which is usually pronounced with brininess and savoriness.

The half lobster was also just awkward on the plate. I appreciate that it was easy to remove since they cut it and placed it back into the shell, so it wasn’t a struggle to eat, but the lobster doesn’t really tie the dish together. It’s just a well cooked, tender half lobster resting next to a plate of pasta, not incorporated into a cohesive dish. The pasta itself was also overcooked, and the hollow bucatini doesn’t do much to pick up the sauce since there wasn’t much sauce to begin with, leaving the noodles a bit soggy. I would have preferred spaghetti or fettuccine, which would have had a better bite.

In its current state the dish just seems like a plain pasta dish with a side of lobster that doesn’t justify the $55 price tag, and with the mandatory 20% gratuity it’s closer to $66 for half a lobster. The dish needs real work, more herbs, more garlic, or just serve the lobster meat separately and use the shells to make a concentrated stock for a more seafood forward pasta sauce.