Michelin-Starred Sushi Chefs Bring Omakase Pop-Up at Dassai Blue Sake Brewery This Weekend
The Hyde Park sake brewery’s growing sushi program is getting serious November 7-10.
Since opening its doors to the public in 2023, Dassai Blue’s Hyde Park sake brewery has continually expanded its cultural and culinary offerings. This past spring, in response to customer feedback, the onsite tasting room rolled out a lunchtime sushi program to accompany the sakes available for sampling. And now, as we move into fall and Dassai’s third year, the brewery is deepening its culinary footprint with periodic omakase pop-ups featuring Michelin-starred sushi chefs. The next round of events are this weekend, November 7 through 10.
Fresh Fish, Flame, and Fermentation
On a Friday night in mid-October, the mezzanine of Dassai Blue was dark except for the pool of light around Chef Tasuku Murakami, who stood behind a walnut podium armed with a blowtorch and the quiet authority of someone who’s been around Michelin stars. The rest of us—12 diners arrayed around a U-shaped table—sat in near darkness, sipping sake and watching Murakami sear yellowtail like a man performing a slow-burn magic trick.
Murakami, who made his name at Sushi Amane in Manhattan, now presided over a more intimate stage. Dassai Blue, the American outpost of Japan’s revered Asahi Shuzo brewery, is a spotless temple of fermentation, where rice is polished to a near-philosophical degree of precision and every sake tells you, in its own quiet way, that less is more. Murakami gets that. His omakase dinner—a four-act suite of sashimi and sake—wasn’t about dazzle so much as depth.
The first round, paired with Dassai Type 23, set the tone: Madai snapper ceviche with sake lees, bluefin tuna in both its modest and decadent incarnations, and yellowtail so clean it practically whispered. The flavors were delicate, like calligraphy rendered in citrus and salt.
Round two, with Type 35, deepened the conversation. Steamed abalone. Poached scallop. Horse mackerel with a snap of ginger. Each bite small, deliberate, fleeting. The kind of meal that rewards slowing down and shutting up.
Then came the torch show: Murakami caramelizing teriyaki glaze onto buri (adult yellowtail) until it shimmered, the air filling with smoke and promise. Dassai’s Nigori sake—slightly cloudy and wild—played counterpoint.
By the fourth round, paired with Dassai “Future with Farmers,” the chef had moved into full grace-note territory: sea urchin cream handled with uncommon restraint, blackthroat sea perch with yuzu kosho, sweet shrimp, miso soup. Dessert—a featherweight cheesecake—landed like a pleasant sigh.
Dassai Blue makes clean, elegant sake, and pairing it with Murakami’s equally measured cooking felt like a natural progression. Both are exercises in control that somehow feel freeing. By the end, the brewery’s quiet hum and the lingering perfume of yuzu made it hard to tell where the food stopped and the air began.
This was omakase as meditation, yes—but also as spectacle, science, and sensory high-wire act. Or, to put it less politely: a very good night to be one of 12 lucky diners sitting in the dark.
Upcoming Omakase Dinners at Dassai Blue
If you missed Murakami’s transcendent, two-night takeover at Dassai in October, he returns to the brewery this weekend for three nights of omakase excellence. On Friday, November 7, there will be two lunch seatings at 12:30 and 1:30pm. The dinner events, taking place Friday and Saturday at 6pm and Sunday November 9 at 3:30pm, are single-seating and by reservation. Much like the previous iteration, the Michelin-starred chef will prepare a multi-course dinner for $250 a diner, with the option to add on a $30 sake pairing.
The grand finale, however, takes place on Monday, November 10, when Murakami teams up with Icca chef Kazushige Suzuki for an exclusive 16-course omakase dinner, with a special guest appearance by Dassai’s chairman Hiroshi Sakurai. Suzuki trained for over two decades in Edomae-style sushi in Tokyo, Shanghai, and Hawaii before heading to New York City. Under his direction, Icca earned a Michelin star in its first year. A meal for early-bird gourmands, this one-night-only event kicks off at 5:30pm. Dinner is $285 a person, plus the optional sake pairing.
