There’s a new restaurant in town that offers three types of Japanese dining in one place. You can sit at the sushi bar, at a table or booth, or the ever-popular, albeit loudly entertaining, tableside cooking in front of a large grill and animated cook.

Since you can have anything from the menu at any site, on a recent visit to Samurai Steak and Sushi my dining companions and I opted for a booth.

Right away we were impressed with the décor. It was contemporary and inviting. Deep black paint coats the ceiling and most of the walls, with highlights of gold, red and gray painted randomly on a small wall, the alcove, or a pillar. A short wall has bamboo painted on glass separating the grill dining from the rest of the restaurant, but we could still hear the clanging of spatulas on the grill. If you’re looking for a quiet evening, you won’t find it here, even if you do sit away from the grills.

I think I’ve now ordered soft shell crab at a handful of local restaurants. I took yet another chance and was again disappointed. I’ve decided the delicious soft shell crab I had in Louisville was a fluke and that perhaps I just don’t like it. This crab was dry, tough and overly fishy in taste.

While Samurai offers all the usual types of sushi, sashimi, rolls and a few of its own creations, what I liked was that there were sushi bar ideas listed under the appetizer portion of the menu. This means if you’re a beginner, you don’t have to hit or miss on the sushi menu selection, or ask your waiter a million and one questions to make sure you get something you want to eat.

We ordered one plate of a variety of sushi appetizers, one of the same for sashimi and a California roll. Both the sushi and sashimi plates came with raw tuna, salmon, white fish and other raw fish, served alone or over rice. The sushi rice was not sticky enough and fell apart as we tried to eat it with chopsticks. The white fish was tough and chewy and I could barely finish eating it once I took that first bite.

This was the first time I’ve had white fish, and perhaps that’s just how it is, but I’ve eaten eel, squid and even quail eggs and none of those items was as distasteful as the white fish was.

The California roll, which I usually order for anyone at the table who doesn’t like raw fish since it has cooked crab and avocado in the center, was served with small, raw fish eggs on the top. This was out of character for California rolls, in my experience, and meant my reason for ordering them was made moot by the tiny fish eggs.

While Samurai offers a variety of steaks, seafood, hibachi dinners and chef’s specialties that are in the higher price ranges, that night I opted to keep the ticket prices reasonable for the average diner. I was meeting my daughter’s new boyfriend for the first time and we all decided to keep it low-key, making it a teriyaki and tempura night.

My daughter had the teriyaki salmon and the flavor was incredible, with a moist, tender salmon filet with a mild teriyaki sauce. What I liked about the sauce was that I could taste each ingredient separately, but also as a unit. The soy sauce, the ginger and the garlic all came alive as I ate each bite and then all melded together in the end.

My dining companion and I shared the tempura and chicken teriyaki plate. The tempura was done as usual, crispy tender pieces of shrimp, zucchini, mushrooms and other veggies. The chicken in the teriyaki was tough, however, and served with a lot of mushrooms. This was disappointing to my dining companion, who doesn’t like mushrooms, because he did not see this in the description on the menu, and also to me, who doesn’t mind mushrooms but didn’t expect that many with a teriyaki dish.

The teriyaki sauce in the chicken did not seem as flavorful or thick as the sauce on the salmon.

The meals were served with miso soup, salad with a ginger or sweet house dressing, and fried or steamed rice. The lettuce was especially crisp and cold; the salad dressings acceptable but too thick for my taste. The fried rice was a little greasy, but some of the freshest and most flavorful I’ve had in town.

Finally, we had deep-fried ice cream. The outside shell was too thick for some of us at the table, just right for others. Which sums up our experience: overall, just so-so.

Everything was acceptable, nothing to boast about, but nothing to really complain about. Our waiter was attentive but not very communicative and while he may have been informed about other things, the few questions we asked him he answered quickly, quietly and smiling a lot.

I guess my thought was, why have yet another sushi place in town unless there is something that really stands out as uniquely different among the rest?

Samurai Steak and Sushi

2718 Scottsville Road

Bowling Green KY 42104

782-5004

Hours: Lunch 11 a.m.-2 p.m. daily; dinner, 4:30 p.m. -10 p.m. daily

Cuisine: Japanese

Specialties: Sushi, sashimi, steaks

Price range for dinner: $10.95-$32.95

Libation situation: Full bar

Smoking: No