Please note that since writing this blog post, Yatta Sushi has closed down
Until a few days ago, there was only one reason to go to Watergraafsmeer as far as I was concerned: de Kas. Oh, and possibly Merkelbach if you happened to get lost in the Frankendael park on the way home from Intratuin. But last Saturday night, I found myself wandering through the strangely suburban, pedestrianised shopping streets of Watergraafsmeer for a different reason: the Amsterdam Burlesque Awards.
Anyway, I digress. The Amsterdam Burlesque Awards were held at the CMA Zaal, the dullness of whose name is directly proportional to the awesomeness of the venue. Think red velvet curtains, scarlet feathers, 20s-style artwork and a stage within charmingly intimate proximity of its audience. I was there with friends from the UK (they’d come over especially for the show) and we were all corseted up and ready to go at 6.30 pm. So by the time we realised that some pre-performance dinner was probably a good idea, we were looking for something light that wouldn’t pop the buttons on our sailor’s jackets.
Enter Yatta Sushi. Because sushi is light – right? Probably not in the quantities I consume it in, but that’s beside the point. Yatta is just off the end of the Transvaalkade in a small canal-side arcade of cute-looking shops and cafes. It’s modern inside, with several low-level tables that customers can sit at cross-legged on floor cushions. Luckily for us and our corsets, they had regular tables too.
A quick glance at the menu confirmed that they offered what I’d call “American-style sushi” as well as the simpler style of sushi I’m more used to in Europe. Possibly the best thing I ate was the simplest of them all: the mixed sashimi comprised salmon, tuna, scallops, seabass and prawns – all extremely fresh and very high quality.
Of the “bangs and whistles” variety of sushi, we ordered lots: a frontrunner for me was the tempura-fried rolls stuffed with fried duck (what was that I was saying about sushi being light?!). We also tried the beef and truffle “new style” rolls with garlic and sweet soy sauce, as well as some spicy tuna temaki topped with their own little jalapeno hats. For afters (because I can never stop when there’s a sushi menu around), we ordered some unagi rolls that were dressed up almost as prettily as the Burlesque crowd an hour later.
Now thoroughly stuffed, I paid the bill and put my heels on. Because even in deepest, darkest Watergraafsmeer, there’s always Saturday night mischief to be made…