Desserts are not really a Japanese tradition, although Shiki lists several. We had a very elegant piece of raspberry mousse cake ($5), mango sorbet with a strong flavor of ripe mango ($5), and green-tea ice cream with adzuki bean sauce. The latter, like the flight of sakes, is an exercise in dry-on-dry. They do have espresso and decaf espresso.
Shiki is tiny and hard to find, but filled by 7:30 on a weeknight. The crowd runs to Japanese families and mixed couples. I don’t know if its success is because there was a niche for traditional Japanese snacks that wasn’t being filled, or if a pendulum that swung far into sushi is now starting to swing back toward sukiyaki and tempura. Certainly you could eat nothing but the fried food here and it would be memorable.
Robert Nadeau can be reached at RobtNadeau@aol.com.
