Where the Sushi Is Plane Good

Japanese restaurants are few and far between in the small Midwestern town where my friend Alan lives, so whenever he comes to Los Angeles, the first thing he wants to do is satisfy his craving for sushi. I’ve taken him to Sushi Roku, Katsu on 3rd, R-23 and, one late night, Shibucho. We’ve even splurged on Ginza Sushi-Ko, which for Alan was like dying and going straight to sushi heaven. This time, I tell him, I want to take him to a new place called the Hump.

The Hump? I explain that the restaurant is at the Santa Monica Airport and that the Hump was the nickname World War II pilots who flew supplies into China over Mt. Everest gave the forbidding Himalayan mountain. The sushi master at the Hump is Hiro Nishimura, who worked with Katsu Michite at Katsu in Los Feliz, and later founded R-23, the sushi restaurant in the warehouse district east of Little Tokyo.

Owned by Brian Vidor, the Hump is built on top of Typhoon, Vidor’s popular pan-Asian restaurant in the airport’s main building. When you walk upstairs to the third-floor sushi bar and restaurant, you leave behind Typhoon’s frenetic clamor. On the entry terrace overlooking the runway, it’s dark and quiet, and there’s a telescope you can train on the skyline or the stars. Occasionally a small plane will taxi down the runway or land just in front of the restaurant.

The room feels like some outpost at a small airfield in the tropics. The ceiling is covered in woven sea grass and crisscrossed with staves of bamboo. Ship’s lanterns hang above the L-shaped sushi bar. There’s a fireplace on the far wall, and liquor bottles are set out on an ornately carved sideboard. Most dramatic is an etched-glass panel behind the bar by artist Scott Boren that depicts a tiny plane dwarfed by the immense Himalayas.

The silver-haired man in jeans is Vidor, a former helicopter pilot. While we wait for a place at the sushi bar, he tells us that he had originally intended to open a sushi bar in the Typhoon space but airport officials wanted something less exotic. He shelved the idea and gradually went from serving egg salad sandwiches to offering Typhoon’s current eclectic menu. With the Hump, he’s finally getting the chance to do what he envisioned in the first place.

By the time we’re seated, beer and sake are flowing freely and the folks at the sushi bar are feeling good. Alan waves away the menus and asks the sushi chef to give us omakase, the chef’s choice. We begin with some pretty little bites: skate on a leaf of endive, monkfish liver topped with salmon eggs, and Japanese sardine wrapped in nori and flash-fried in a lacy tempura batter. Translucent halibut the color of ice is cut into thin slices, each with the tiniest dab of Japanese chile and capers, then misted in a veil of yuzu. Baby abalone comes sliced and combined with shiitake mushrooms. Occasionally, a dish is flooded with too much ponzu--Americans generally like more sauce than the Japanese--but a wonderfully sweet seared scallop is simply garnished with a squirt of Japanese citrus. After that, we can manage only a few exquisite pieces of sushi: beautifully marbled toro, kampachi from Tokyo’s Tsukiji fish market, Spanish mackerel from Japan and ochre-colored uni, sea urchin roe, sashed with crisped nori. All in all, it’s a satisfying sushi encounter, and Alan gives me the thumbs up.

I return with someone else another night and sit at one of the tables facing the airfield and order off the sushi menu. Two women waiting

for the bill at another table volunteer their recommendations. Get the halibut sashimi--it’s fabulous, one promises. Also the hamachi, the other pipes up. And they’re right: The fish is incredibly fresh and subtle in taste. We also order the Spanish mackerel and mirugai, jumbo clam. Even the salmon sashimi, not usually my favorite, is well-marbled and very flavorful. At another table, two academics, both old Asia hands, regale friends with tales of their first-time travels in Japan. They wave for the waiter to pour more sake and bring another plate of edamame, boiled salted soybeans. A few moments later, the waiter staggers over to their table, bearing a yard-long handmade ceramic platter covered with festive rows of nigiri-zushi. Katsu had the idea first, I know, and they do this at R-23, too--still, it’s a terrific presentation.

I go back to the Hump a couple more times for omakase. Each of the sushi chefs is capable of turning out an interesting series of little dishes interspersed with sashimi and sushi. On one occasion, I enjoy fried tofu squares topped with Japanese eggplant in a chilled broth, and three beautiful rolls of translucent halibut wrapped around uni. Chef Nishimura sends out a platter with a bowl of slimy, sweet and vinegary--very delicious, really--seaweed, a little okra and a beautiful piece of fish poached on the bone. Later there’s chawan mushi, a delicate savory custard inset with shrimp and gingko nuts served in a lidded porcelain dish.

On another evening, we’re presented with what looks like a snowball of salmon: alternating slices of white and coral salmon sashimi draped over a ball of julienned daikon and cucumber. A very refreshing dish. An exquisite tempura of eel, perfectly cooked and set down on a square of white paper, is garnished with a long curve of eel bone, deep-fried and crunchy. The piece de resistance is a Japanese conch shell nestled in salt that has been set aflame, warming the rich delicious broth inside. We fish out chunks of conch meat and shiitake, finding more hidden in the shell’s spiral.

Clearly, this place is more than your corner sushi bar. The food is not only a cut above, but the setting also has style and panache. In fact, the Hump may be the only sushi restaurant in the country with a runway outside and patrons who fly in for sparkling-fresh sushi prepared by two veteran sushi masters.

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The Hump Sushi Bar & Restaurant

Cuisine: Japanese. Ambience: Handsome sushi bar with tables as well, plus an outdoor deck with a runway view of Santa Monica Airport. Best Dishes: Sashimi, sushi, omakase (chef’s choice). Sake Picks: Harushika, Bitchu Wajo. Facts: Santa Monica Airport, 3221 Donald Douglas Loop South, 3rd Floor, Santa Monica; (310) 313-0977. Dinner Monday through Saturday. Sushi, $3 to $10; specials, $4 to $16; omakase, $50 and up. Corkage $10. Parking in lot.