Todai is a Japanese culinary jewel

DINING OUT

Opening the door to Todai, the Japanese restaurant at Beach Boulevard

and Warner Avenue, is like lifting the lid of a culinary jewelry box

filled with gem-like sushi and tiny petit fours.

Todai offers an all you can eat buffet (lunch $12.95 Monday

through Friday, dinner $21.95) where the temptation is immediate.

There is a raised carousel of more than 200 varieties of vegetables,

sushi rolls and desserts, in the center of which Chef Margarito Lara

and his assistants work to replenish the fresh foods.

Toward the back of the restaurant are large kettles filled with

steamed rice, three kinds of soup and the hot selections. Like the

sushi, each offering is an artistic presentation. The slices of

pungent teriyaki beef have whole earthy mushrooms lining each side of

the tray. Colorful spicy hot buffalo wings are meaty, if slightly

greasy. The Gyoza, Japanese pot stickers with a soft wonton skin, are

fat and filled with minced meat.

If you prefer a salad to begin your meal, return to the carousel

where sushi chef Aung Pei has prepared a mixed seafood salad and a

crunchy crab meat one; there are thin threadlike gelatin strands of

spicy seaweed, great long green beans and edamame, the Japanese name

for green soy beans.

On the center carousel you’ll also find tender tasty, although

slightly dry, swordfish, some great trays of crab legs filled with

moist meat opened by crackers supplied at your table. You will also

find a whole section of California rolls wrapped like gifts in a

sticky white rice. The chefs in the center are busily preparing 12

varieties of sushi, little squid and eel.

Manager Yuichi Koyasu says foods are delivered daily from a

Japanese market as there is little storage room for anything frozen.

An additional attraction is Shabu Shabu ($21.95, Monday through

Thursday) where prime rib is given to each diner to prepare in a pot

of hot broth and then dipped in several sauces for added taste. Fun

to do and great to eat.

You might finish your brunch with one of pastry chef Pablo

Alvarado’s dainty cakes or unusual and delicious azuki red beans in a

sweet liquid.

Eating at Todai is an adventurous introduction to the many ways

Japanese food can be prepared and enjoyed -- a place families can

bring their children for a taste of the Orient.