Itamae Sushi - Late Night Dining in Tokyo (Shimbashi Station)板前寿司新橋店

We found Itamae Sushi Shimbashi (板前寿司新橋店) when we were looking for late night dining in Tokyo recently. We were at the Shimbashi-Shiodome Station vicinity around 11pm. Feeling in the mood for a late supper before calling it a night, we scanned Google maps for places to eat around the area. There is a hive of small eateries along the lanes behind the main Shimbashi JR Station. The one that caught our eye was Itamae Sushi which has decent ratings on Tripadvisor.

If travelling by train or Tokyo Metro, it is best to locate Itamae Sushi, by using the JR Shimbashi Station Karasumori Exit. The sushi restaurant is only a 3-minute walk away. But do note the last train and station closing times (which I think is around midnight). The easy connectivity of the underpasses are no longer available after that time. Many of the restaurants around Shimbashi Station are small places, often with Japanese signboards only. Itamae Sushi’s big bright signboard was easy to see from afar.

Itamae Sushi Tokyo Shimbashi Station

The interior of the restaurant is similar to a typical Japanese sushi restaurant. There is a counter dining area and some tables at the side.

Here are pictures of some pages from the Itamae Sushi Shimbashi menu. We decided to order a fresh bluefin tuna sushi combo (2,780 yen), a half combo (1,680 yen) and some cooked food items.

Late Night Supper in Tokyo

There is a 300 yen “table charge” per person. A small snack (above picture) was served after our order was taken. I don’t know what it was probably some kind of shellfish. Salty and chewy – something to munch on with our beers while waiting for the real food to arrive.

Fresh Bluefin Tuna Sushi Combo was the first to arrive. It was a generous platter of 2 pieces of Kama-toro fatty tuna, 3 pieces of fatty tuna, 5 pieces of fresh bluefin tuna, 1 minced tuna roll, minced tuna with pickled radish (with soup and salad included). The toro and fatty tuna sushi were of course the best but the regular tuna items were very good as well. It was a lot of sushi for 2,480 yen!

The fresh tuna combo (half serving) was a smaller serving of tuna sushi. There was no kama toro in this set. But we were glad that we had a smaller portion as two large combos would be too much for one night.

Curious about the other types of sushi on the menu, we decided to try the “sea urchin warship” (¥ 498 each) from the a la carte menu. We were not impressed by the uni sushi as the texture of the sea urchin was too mushy for our liking. We would stick to their tuna offerings at future visits.

We also tried a couple of cooked food items – deep fried tuna cheek (¥ 880) and a grilled fish item (¥ 980). Both of them were very good. Especially to go with beer. After that we called it a night. After our late night dining adventure in Tokyo, we had to find our way back to our hotel which thankfully was a short walk away on a cold winter’s night.