Chef Shuffle

Chefs Shuffle at Blowfish Sushi

This news arrives a couple months late, but there’s been some chef shuffling in the kitchen at Blowfish Sushi (2170 Bryant Street). Former sushi chef Kenichi Kawashima departed on less than amicable terms back in February, and he’s been replaced in the kitchen by Takeshi Ito, who transferred up from the restaurant’s San Jose location.

To clarify Grub Street’s earlier rumor mongering, Blowfish tells us they “no longer have any relationship with Kawashima” and therefore have no designs on the former Lingba space — that is Kawashima’s own project, the details of which we’re looking into.

Blowfish (tagline: To Die For), with its two Bay Area outposts, is one of only a handful of restaurants in the country where you can eat the potentially deadly flesh of the fugu, and executive chef Ritsuo Tsuchida is licensed by the Japanese government to cut and serve the fish — the organs of one of which contain enough toxin to kill 30 adults.

Tsuchida remains on board at the restaurant as exec, and has been actively back on the line in recent months, preparing to unveil the first menu revision at Blowfish in almost a decade. The new menu, which will likely include some new non-sushi, “neo-Asian-fusion” items, should be making its debut by early June, and general manager Sasha Rodgers says, “Everyone here is really excited for the change.”

Chefs Shuffle at Blowfish Sushi