It’s no fluke: Izakaya’s menu—including this flounder dish—is crafted with care. (photo by michael persico)

Restaurant Review

Izakaya

by Adam Erace

Izakaya’s resident DJ clickety-clacks a MacAir, a contemporary pied piper luring passersby across an inch-thick glass footbridge and over a moat of inky moonstones. The Prince Charming of this fairytale land is Michael Schulson, cinematically tall and broad-shouldered with a shock of sandy hair. In June the native New Yorker replaced Susanna Foo as Borgata’s new star chef, ironic since he worked for Walnut Street’s dumping queen before moving onto Pod and the Philly and Manhattan Buddakans. Her Suilan is now his Izakaya, transformed by Alvarez-Brock Design with dramatic black crystal chandeliers, a glassed-in sake library and patent leather settees.

Able waitresses in barely there tangerine dresses flit table to table like hummingbirds, pollinating patrons with toxic ginger lemonades, cucumber martinis and swan-necked carafes of shimmering sake.

Despite my reservation, I’m banished to the bar for half an hour. Well-heeled managers would do well to quit glad-handing VIPs and untangle the clusterfuck.

Another night I’m seated immediately in the lounge that bulges onto the casino floor like a goiter from Izakaya’s neck. The high-backed serpentine banquette and pterodactyl cage canopy effectively encloses the space, but fails to mute the Wheel of Fortunes jangling in the distance.

Though the setup of Izakaya isn’t perfect, the food nearly is. Inspired by Japan’s casual pubs of the same name, Schulson has created an anthology of small plates that are interesting, thoughtful and delightfully quirky without compromising Japan’s exacting culinary standards.

Whole fish fly in four days a week, freshness reflected in both prices and quality. Expect to spend $8 per piece of precisely sliced kanpachi nigiri, and $14 to get your o-toro on. The fatty tuna belly is steaklike in its richness, balanced by the 48-hour house-brewed soy and buttons of hand-grated wasabi. Oregon sea urchin is available raw (but better folded into a decadent risotto), and live Barnegat divers are shucked to order for sweet scallop sashimi.

Schulson’s tempura wizardry cloaks kabocha squash boomerangs and DiBruno’s buffalo mozzarella in extra-crisp, extra-light cocoons. Dunked into bright Jersey tomato marinara splashed with soy, sake and yuzu, the latter are like mozzarella sticks of the highest order. Tempura also encases flaky halibut and Japanese mountain potatoes in an Asian-inspired fish and chips wrapped in the sports page of a Tokyo newspaper.

Then, an uncoordinated blur of deliciousness ensues: ethereal edamame dumplings floating in a judiciously truffled sweet sake broth; Australian Kobe tataki bejeweled with jicama and Asian pear; glorious duck-and-foie-gras meatballs and skewered prawns in salty prosciutto straitjackets from the robatayaki grill; juicy miso-glazed chicken; playful panko-fried “veal Milanese” tucked into fluffy steamed buns; seven pepper-dusted fillets of local flounder presented on their own deep-fried edible skeleton.

Not all tricks are so successful. The hot oil dousing the new-style hamachi sashimi only makes me crave old-style hamachi sashimi, while scrawny strawberries and stale shortcake plague one of my all-time favorite desserts. Capped with an overcooked sunny-side-up egg, the dry soybean-and-crab fried rice feels like a Buddakan knock-off. Five-spice doughnuts infringe on Starr copyright, though Schulson serves his airy fritters with Jersey blueberries and the earth’s smoothest ice cream.

Tofu makes said scoop silky, emblematic of Izakaya’s seamless sweet-savory link between dinner and dessert. Panko streusel dusts a cloudlike yuzu soufflé, while sparkling shiso-and-sake seltzer poured tableside over honeydew, cantaloupe and watermelon sorbets accentuates each melon’s individuality. It’s a grassy, musky, honeyed haiku you’ll remember long after you’re hitting the hardways at craps.

Izakya’s ante might be high—figure $150 per couple, with drinks—but in a casino, where dining can be the riskiest game of all, Schulson’s Japanese jackpot is at least one bet you can count on.