Sushi On The Dais At Cilantro Thai And Sushi

I had heard a lot of good things about a local addition to the local food scene in Akron, Cilantro Thai and Sushi Restaurant. While I knew it was downtown, I had never really bothered to find out where until today. I had been hanging out with some friends when the idea of eating dinner came up. Naturally, they turned to me for a suggestion and when I asked them what type of food they were eager to try, Thai food came into the conversation. When I mentioned that Cilantro had been on my "Place To Eat" list for a while, they quickly agreed that we should head there tonight for dinner.

Cilantro was located at 326 South Main Street, Akron, OH 44308 and can be reached at 330-434-2876. There was no parking available specifically for the restaurant, but there was plenty of available curbside parking and since we had gone on a Sunday, it was essentially free since the meters weren't being monitored. As it turned out, the restaurant was actually only a few blocks south of the stadium where the Akron Aeros play and just a few more blocks away from the Lock 3 Park area.

Here was a shot of the front entrance:


As you open the door, a rather annoying electronic beep could be heard. Once inside the main doors, the entrance to Cilantro was on the right. Another set of beeps was heard once those doors had been breached as well. The first thing I noticed once inside the restaurant was how expansive it was. It had a real art deco, early to mid 1930's feel to it and in the middle of the restaurant, was the sushi bar on a dais. What I didn't realize at the time I dined at Cilantro was that this was the location of the old Piatto restaurant (now Piatto Novo at the Sheraton in Cuyahoga Falls). While you could definitely seat yourself at the sushi bar for a more authentic sushi experience, today we were in the mood for the Thai portion of the menu.

Speaking of the menu, here were snapshots that I took:







As you can see from the photos above, it was a combination of about half Thai and half Japanese dishes. I liked the fact that the Japanese portion of the menu wasn't just sushi. I rarely eat just sushi for dinner anymore and like you will see in just a bit, I more often order a few choice pieces as an appetizer.

I decided to start my meal out with two orders of nigiri sushi, two pieces per order:


Here you have both hamachi (yellow tail) and unagi (barbecued eel). As with most sushi, it was artfully and simply presented and it was incredibly fresh and tasty. Even the vinegared rice (which is what sushi actually means in Japanese) tasted recently made. Both types of seafood had a clean taste to them and it was clear that whomever was running the sushi bar knew what good seafood should taste like. I did use just a tiny bit of wasabi with the hamachi, but other than a light dip in some soy sauce, I ate them as they were plated.

Having finished our appetizers, I eagerly awaited my main course, a green curry with chicken. Why eagerly awaited, gentle reader? When I ordered it, I asked for the range of spiciness at Cilantro. Our server informed us that the dishes could be made from zero (0) to five (5). When I asked if five really was the hottest level, my server hemmed and hawed a little bit before admitting that there really was an additional level of heat, "Thai spicy." As I'm sure any long time reader of my blog already knows, I have employed that term "Thai spicy," in numerous Thai restaurants only to find out that for true Thai spicy food, in the end I always have to add extra superlatives to the phrase such as "extra Thai hot" or "extra extra Thai spicy."

Our waitress today assured me that "Thai spicy" was the hottest the kitchen would make it and she had never seen anyone actually order it that spicy since she had started working there. Still skeptical I would get the food at the right spice level, I went ahead and ordered it "Thai spicy." I'm glad I did.

Here was a shot of the curry I received:


Two things bothered me when this was coming to our table. First, either the kitchen was sloppy or our server was a tad uncoordinated because there was sauce all over the rim of the plate. I have a feeling that because there wasn't anything between the ceramic plate and the ceramic bowl in which the curry had been plated, the bowl had slid around a bit too much between kitchen and table. Second, I was concerned because there didn't appear to be a lot of red flakes in the curry, usually a good sign that fresh Thai chillies had been used.

Not to be deterred, however, I spooned some of the curry over the inverted bowl of steamed rice I had received with my meal:


As I took those first few tentative bites, I tasted the green curry, the coconut milk, and the intense heat from the chillies. Apparently the lack of red flecks didn't mean a whole lot because this baby was on fire with chili heat. This was exactly what I was after and after I offered my dining companions a bite (they ordered their dishes at a two), they politely declined figuring that they wouldn't be able to taste anything else after trying my dish. The curry itself was quite tasty and the chicken was cooked through but still tender.

Having finished about half of my curry and rice, I boxed up the remainder for a spicy late night snack later that day. Between my sushi appetizers and my green curry chicken, the bill came to just over $22 with tax. Given that I would get two meals out of it, I think for this level and quality of food, it was definitely worth the price. Up until this point, when I had been jonesing for Thai food, I had been going to Siamone's Thai Pub over by Springfield Lake. Knowing that I have another Akron restaurant where I can get my "Thai spicy" fix (with the additional benefit that Cilantro's menu offered far more dishes than Siamone's) for Thai food and with the quality of the sushi I had received tonight, I highly recommend that you give Cilantro Thai and Sushi Restaurant a try. I know that I intend to return very soon for another great authentic meal.

A Wonderful Culinary Discovery at Pacific East

While originally planning a dinner outing for a group of out-of-town college friends, I discovered that several of my friends expressed an interest in sushi. The fact that two of us had eaten the pristine sushi at Pacific East on Coventry Road in Cleveland Heights prior to this led me to suggest that we return for an encore meal. I have eaten at this location and at the location in the Eton Collective in Beachwood and I have always had wonderfully fresh and delicious sushi in both spots.

After ditching my car in the public parking deck in Coventry (which by the way, gentle reader, they have installed new parking meters that only accept quarters now ... don't do as I did and only realize this after putting in a handful of dimes wondering why no minutes were accumulating on the read-out), I walked up the road to 1763 Coventry Road, right across the street from Grum's Sub Shoppe and saw this awning outside of the restaurant:


Once inside, I sat down and waited for my friends to arrive. The first thing I noticed that differed from my last visit was the creation of a separate Malaysian menu:


In prior visits, there was always just one menu devoted to mostly Japanese dishes. A small portion of that menu was dedicated to a few of their Malay specialties. I was actually happy to see this new menu; it was replete with an exciting array of dishes that I had heard about in my various epicurean travels but had never had a chance to try. Along with the Malaysian menu, there was also the traditional Japanese menu:


Having originally picked Pacific East because of their sushi, I was now beginning to rethink my strategy a bit. Perhaps a combination of Japanese and Malaysian cuisines would be on my radar tonight. When my dinner companions finally arrived a few minutes later, they also made the same startling discovery. As a result, we ended up ordering a mixture of cuisines, but most of the ordering would be from the Malaysian menu.

My one associate decided to do a maki roll and nigiri starter. He ordered the eel maki roll and a piece of the uni nigiri:


Having had uni several times before, I could never understand why everyone always raved about. Honestly, the problem I had always had with uni was a textural issue. I won't go into what the issue I had was, but let's just say it reminded me quite a bit of the experience of having sinusitis. That being said, I had never even considered trying the uni at Pacific East before. Knowing how good the rest of the sushi was, I decided to give it one more try and piggy-backed an extra piece on my friend's order; the second piece of uni nigiri you see sitting on that plate was for me.

My friend went first and ate his piece. He confirmed that it was indeed very good uni. At least I knew that I now had the opportunity to try a piece of uni that had been positively confirmed by someone with a more educated palate than mine. I dipped the rice quickly in just a little bit of soy sauce and put the entire thing in my mouth. I chewed slowly to make sure I experienced the texture to its fullest and to allow the flavor to develop in my mouth. What was the verdict? I have to give props where they are due; this was by far the best version of uni I have ever eaten. I can also see why some people compare the texture of uni to foie gras. It has that same sort of mouth feel to it. The flavor was briny and fatty. Was I able to swallow the piece in my mouth? Absolutely. Would I ever order this again? The answer lies somewhere in the middle of "maybe" to "probably not". At least I finally knew what good uni was supposed to taste like.

Shortly after, my appetizer arrived, the chicken satay with peanut dipping sauce:


Having had this dish numerous times at Thai restaurants, Pacific East's version was good, but not great. The chicken had decent flavor and was nicely grilled. The peanut dipping sauce was a bit of a letdown for me though. You could definitely taste the peanut, ginger, and fish sauce flavors, but it really didn't have any zip to it. Granted, the menu indicated that it wasn't a spicy dish, so I can't fault them too much for delivering on that promise, but still, that would've really elevated this dish in my mind.

My dining companion who ordered the eel and uni appetizer decided to order the chicken rendeng:


Served with plain rice, this was quite good. The chicken was tender and flavorful and you could really get a nice sense of the lemongrass and coconut milk infused into the dish. The dish is marked as a "medium" spice level on the menu and that was how my friend ordered it. To my palate, this dish was more of a mild than a medium. For customers who can't do heat at all, this would definitely be spicy. For those with a more adventurous palate, you might want to ask them to take it a few spice levels higher.

I decided to order the laksa:


The menu describes the laksa as, "Noodles in full of flavors - slightly creamy infused with coconut milk, seafood, egg, tofu, chichen and bean sprouts, chili and spices." Interesting translation to English aside, this was a really lovely dish. The menu indicates that this is a "spicy" dish. Knowing my penchant for extremely spicy food, I asked the waiter if there were different levels of spiciness. He indicated that there really weren't, but he'd be happy to bring me a side of chili sauce so that I could adjust it myself. It turns out that the cook was happy to make it hotter for my taste and it came out already adjusted. I'd say the spice level was somewhere between medium and spicy. It was definitely spicier than my friend's chicken rendeng, but not so spicy that I couldn't taste the other ingredients in the dish.

The egg noodles were nice, sort of like ramen noodles. They were tender to the tooth and while you couldn't really pick up any of the egg flavor from the actual noodle, the dish was studded with hard boiled eggs to reinforce the flavor. The broth was a lovely mix of spicy and creamy; the coconut milk acted to reduce the spicy edge from the chilies. The seafood mentioned in the menu description actually refers to several shrimp that were in the bowl. These were a nice size, but they were a slight bit overcooked and just a touch rubbery. However, that is really the only criticism I have of the entire dish. It was quite delicious and I would order it again when I return. Actually, to be honest, the Malaysian menu is so thorough now that you could order from it the next twenty times you go to the restaurant and still not have worked your way through everything.

To our great surprise, what had initially been an outing for some wonderful Japanese delicacies morphed into an almost all out Malaysian culinary odyssey. I don't know of any other Malay restaurants in Cleveland, Akron, or Canton, so if you want to try out this wonderful cuisine (and I seriously suggest you should), give Pacific East on Coventry Road a try. And don't forget to get at least a little bit of sushi or sashimi while you are there, too.