Lifestyles
THE SCARSDALE INQUIRER, FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 2005
A poetry book defines Haiku as "a tiny poem of Japanese origin creating
a sensation one can almost taste, touch and smell, capturing an intense
moment and pulsating with the rhythms of nature." I define Haiku as the new Asian bistro and sushi bar in Bronxville. It's also small, has Pan Asian food creations to taste and smell, pulsating with the freshness of natural op quality ingredients.
Michael Lee, one of the owners, hails from Malaysia where learned about food at his family's gourmet deli. His love of food brought him to New York. He discovered a huge market for Pan Asian food and decided to bring this experience to Bronxville. He said that he hopes" to open more restaurant following the same concept of Pan Asian food using only fresh ingredients, no canned products and lots of organic ngredients. After all, food is dependent upon quality."
In many Japanese restaurants the su-shi is often excellent, but the hot dishes just ordinary. At Haiku, as in Ja-pan, all aspects of food are respected,
and with experienced sushi chef Ken-
Chen and talented executive chef Simon Chung at the helm, the entire menu is prepared with epertise. Lee has good loves relating to the custo-mers who return often.
Lee believes "a good foundation is everything." Timing, fish personally
chosen each day, and quality make haiku special. Seating about 45 guest,
Haiku is simple yet striking with its banquettes, modern lighting, bamboo shades and colorful Japanese paintings.
An intimate atmosphere is ever-present.
Judie Dweck
New in Bronxville, Haiku Asian Bistro and Sushi Bar is poetically inspired
one of the hot appetizers, proved that
kitchen shines as well as the sushi bar.
Lightly floured, cooked crisp with crispy garlic and onion, it was simple and light.
other starters include homemade wonton soup, seaweed salad with sesa-me vinaigrette, spicy salmon avocado
salad, shumai, Thai vegetable spring rolls, satay, tuna and toro tartare and
sashimi jalapeno. There is a large as-sortment of sushi and sashimi using
seasonal fish,as well as at least 25 rolls
and hand rolls.Chef's special rolls have exotic names such as Dancing eel
dragon roll, sakura roll an snow moun-
tain roll - and the list goes on. A spe-cial Nippon roll was a treat for diners
who like their fish cooked. Inside was
soft shell crab and mango and outside
included eel, shrimp and avocado. A
spicy plum sauce was a perfect accom-
paniment, prepared in the kitchen with fresh plums and plum paste.
Entrees of sesame seeds chicken pre-
pared a la minute with only white meat, Szechwan crispy shredded dried beef, Grand Marnier crispy prawns and
honey walnut, chilean sea bass steam-ed or crisp, teriyaki steak or chicken and Pad Thai are well flavored.
Black pepper steak cooked with a touch of butter and surrounded by baby bok choy was a tangy choice. My favorite was Malaysian red curry with prawns and vegetables, just spicy enough, the vibrant-colored sauce in-cluded chili, oil and coconut cream.
Truly jumbo shrimp combined with eggplant, green beans, okra, potato,
red bell peppers and bean curd for dish
that was simply splendid.
Simple green tea or red bean ice-
cream can complete your dinner or
lunch at Haiku, a fine addition to the
growing number of Asian restaurant in
the area.
Recipes
The chef's simply described several
dishes. If you wish to try them at home you'll need to be creative with the amounts, or do one better: Close your kitchen and head to Haiku.
Sashimi Tuna Salad
Use sashimi quality tuna. Slice it and
roll each clice into a pinwheel. Top
each with sliced jalapeno and a dab of
salmon roe. Place the rolls around a mound of spring greens tossed with herb wasabi olive oil vinaigrette.
Vietnamese Salad
Julienne fresh mango, jicama, kiwi and
carrots. Place in bowl. Top with crispy cellophane noodles, crushed peanuts, crispy onion and fresh cilantro. Toss with lemon olive oil vinaigrette.
Haiku Asian Bistro
and Sushi Bar
56 Pondfield Road
Bronxville
337-5601
Japanese, Thai, Malaysian, Chinese
and Vietnamese appear on the menu and spices unique to each are part of every gloriously presented dish. Coco-nut curry from Malaysia, mango and jicama salad from Vietnam, and Pad Thai from Thailand share the menu with a large assortment of sushi and sashimi, both classic and innovative. It's a restaurant to return to often.
The menu that will change seasonal-ly with certain fish best during certain
months. I was fortunate to visit when toro bluefin tuna was in it's prime (lateOctober to late March). It prati-cally melted in my mouth. The teture was so smooth. It needed to be savor-ed slowly with concentration.
I started a recent meal with Vietnam-ese salad, a bowl of meticulously shredded mango, jicama, carrots and kiwi with crisp cellophane noodles and
crusted peanuts in a light vinaigrette.
It was a refreshing beginning. A sashimi tuna salad followed. Pristinely fresh, tuna was arranged around baby greens dressed with wasabi olive oil
dressing and garnished with salmon roe and jalapeno and a sprinking of pine
nuts. The beatiful presentation in-
dicated care in the visual as well as quality of the dish.
Seafood soup with homemade broth was laden with shrimp, scallop, crab-meat,egg white, cilantro and peas with a delicious result. A bowl of this soup
and a Vietnamese salad would have been a wonderful lunch. ( Of course you know I didn't stop here.) Salmon ceviche arrived as a mound of coarse-ly cut salmon, mango and avocado surrounded by kiwi slices and a passion
yuzu sauce. A dish of peppercorn squid
