Adding to the overall freshness of the fish was a smidge of yuzu kosho to mix into your soy/wasabi dipping sauce. Here, the perfectly seasoned rice was topped with beautiful raw slices of tuna, salmon, yellowtail, and albacore, as well as cooked freshwater eel, shrimp, a delicious, addictive heap of chopped fatty tuna, and masago with fresh wasabi. The word chirashi means “scattered,” allowing for some variations on its contents, but, in a nutshell, it’s a traditional Japanese dish of sashimi on top of rice flavored with rice-vinegar, essentially the flavors of nigiri sushi in a bowl. While we skipped poke, it didn’t seem fair to not at least try one of the bowls featuring raw fish, so we ordered the chirashi. This is not expensive beef they could stand to up the portion. Unfortunately, the beef-to-rice ratio was way off and we were quickly left with more than half a bowl of rice. I’ve never been a huge sukiyaki fan, so it was more or less what I expected: average, yet satisfying. The sukiyaki beef don came layered with thinly sliced curliques of beef and onions cooked in a slightly savory, but ultimately sweet dashi broth over rice. I did not try any of them but opted for their less ubiquitous choices, the other bowls or “don” as they’re referred to in Japanese. You can also get it with just salmon or tofu. As for poke, there’s the classic version with several raw fish varieties, seaweed salad, masago (roe), and cucumber. There are 13 bowls to choose from, each with rice as the base. Aesthetically, it also falls somewhere between the two, but closer to a real restaurant with blonde wood seating, subway tile, and geometric light fixtures. When your order is up, it’s delivered to your table or bar seat. You put your name on a list, and when it comes up, they call you to the counter where you place your order, are given a number, and then take a seat. On a rainy Saturday, the place was packed, and we waited about 30 minutes, all crammed in at the front, for a seat. Well, not completely, because while poke is on offer there, so are a number of other bowls and snacks, defined by the restaurant as “Japanese Comfort Food.” But after hearing about Fremont Bowl, I broke my promise to myself. I swore I wouldn’t go into another poke joint for a long time.

Chirashi bowl seattle