You’ve probably driven by House Of Food Porn dozens of times and wondered what exactly goes on in there. That same curious itch is what eventually led us to this sushi omakase in Little Haiti that doesn’t serve sushi and is omakase only by the technical definition. After an hour and 46 minutes of punchline-free sex jokes, six baffling courses of food that never asked to be sushi, and a $59 donation to a cat sanctuary, we’ve got answers.
But first, a crash course on House Of Food Porn terminology. They make “shushi”—not sushi—and it’s a surprisingly wholesome origin story for a restaurant that feels like Nosferatu’s chamber of kinks. The chef invented shushi for his mom, who wouldn’t eat raw fish and couldn’t pronounce the word sushi. And so a centuries-old cuisine was reimagined into philly cheesesteak rolls and dense cylinders of a picadillo-like substance.
photo credit: Ryan Pfeffer
video credit: Mariana Trabanino
video credit: Mariana Trabanino
video credit: Mariana Trabanino
photo credit: Ryan Pfeffer
There are six shushi experiences to choose from, ranging from $105.93 (five courses) to $668.75 (eight courses and a bottle of Dom). All of them with names like “the kamasutra” or “the 69” (their happy hour deal priced at $69). We chose “the quickie” for $159.43, which lasts about two hours and includes five mostly gray—and occasionally sticky—bites that you eat with your hands. Then there’s dessert, and a bottle of their house cab-merlot blend that arrives in an unmarked crystal decanter and admittedly becomes difficult to confidently sip after the chef drops some inappropriate jokes about spiking said wine.
What, exactly, is in the shushi? You have to guess. The chef, standing proudly in the center of the room like a man who loves secrets, won’t tell you until after you’ve eaten it. Think of it as an omakase in reverse with a looming uncertainty between bites. Some of our courses included: Baked salmon lathered in Boursin cheese with duck breast and foie gras shoved in the center. There was a soufflé with a mess of blended-up sea critters (conch, octopus, cod, grouper) and a quail egg thrown into the mix. The only dish we could confirm with our eyes was the philly cheesesteak topped with “truffle-infused pearls.” We say all of this with only 47% certainty. Although we are 100% certain that none of it tastes very good.
All of this happens in a single dark room with enough open flames to set the place ablaze with a single misplaced sneeze. Red ceiling drapes hang overhead, framed Playboy posters decorate the black walls, and blood red toilet paper greets you in the bathroom. About 10 guests can fit at the wooden counter, and the crowd, truly unpredictable during our visit, might include repeat customers inexplicably back for more, or vacationing Canadians celebrating a birthday. Who knows. Maybe, like us, they stumbled upon the website and thought, this could be interesting. And, sure. Interesting is one word for it.
Luckily, dinner ends on an unexpectedly altruistic note. Your tip at the end of the night goes to the kitten sanctuary the owners help run out of their home. So as you drive home with a lingering aftertaste of lamb, salmon, and philly cheesesteak, just tell yourself it was all for the cats.
Food Rundown“The Quickie”
This $159.43 meal consists of six disorienting courses that taste of various mushy meats and fish, all of which are soft enough to break down with your tongue. Dishes might change, but our first course was a picadillo-esque material wrapped in cured veal. Apparently there was eel at the center, too? Then there was a sticky ocean soufflé and this swirl of goat and lamb meat stuffed with dates and goat cheese. It’s hard to say for sure. There is no written menu to speak of (and it’s dark in there). For dessert, it’s a mercifully simple bread pudding that behaves more like a muffin. Some of the sillier bites would be easier to chalk up to general silliness if it didn’t cost $160. But none of it’s good, all of it’s sticky, and our favorite part of the meal is getting to wipe our hands with the damp black towel in the end.
photo credit: Mariana Trabanino