The hama chil crudo balances sweet oranges, salty ponzue, and a spicy red chiles. | Uchi The long-awaited D.C. outpost of Uchi, an Austin, Texas-based chain centered around sushi and Japanese-influenced fare, finally opens on Tuesday, May 12, just a few blocks south of Dupont Circle (1700 M Street NW). At Uchi, global flavors get mashed up with Japanese techniques at the fast-expanding  Hai Hospitality empire from James Beard award-winning chef Tyson Cole (fun fact: he also inspired adult Bobby Hill on King of the Hill). The menu at the sushi-focused restaurant can be intimidating at first; most of the menu sections have phonetic Japanese titles, but servers are well-trained to break down everything for you. It starts with a long list of nigiri and fresh seafood specials from the Toyosu Fish Market, followed by vegetable starters and fried dishes, and finally diving into sushi rolls and hot or cold fare. Don’t skip the specials from chef Rob Drennan, who started his decades-long culinary career at Uchiko in Austin. (Hai’s other sibling restaurants include Uchibā, Oheya, and LORO Asian Smokehouse Bar.) “This is kind of my homecoming in certain ways,” he tells Eater. The Texas location was his introduction to fine dining. Since then, he’s worked at three-Michelin-starred Maeemo in Oslo and was the senior culinary manager for Rose’s Restaurant Group before he accepted his newest position with Hai Hospitality. Drennan is hoping to showcase his wide-spanning cuisines on the specials page. Opening plates lean into Thai flavors, like buttery lobster with a green curry sauce and a fall-apart grilled yellowtail collar covered in red curry. “Honestly, it’s where I want to retire. The food is the food that I want to eat. I absolutely love Thailand, and I love Thai food,” he says. He clarifies that the dishes won’t always lean into Southeast Asian flavors, but he’s excited to experiment as the seasons change. He’s adding crab to the main menu, including a chawanmushi (steamed egg custard) dish with brown butter and bacon. The Austin original, open since 2003, sits in a refurbished bungalow that inspired the restaurant’s name (“house” in Japanese). Other Texas outposts slowly arrived in Houston (2012) and Dallas (2015), followed by a West Coast expansion to Los Angeles in 2023. Its newfound East Coast reach includes a recent opening in Philly. There are a few dishes that have never left the menu at any Uchi location. The hama chili is known to convert raw fish-skeptics with slices of yellowtail layered with orange supremes and flavored with ponzu and Thai chili. The signature salad is a surprising highlight, with baby lettuce wrapped around long spears of daikon and peppered with crispy rice alongside a creamy cashew pesto for dipping. Another must order is a flight of fatty tuna, with lean to extra fatty cuts topped with their own yakumi, Japanese garnishes meant to complement the flavors of the raw fish. For dessert, don’t skip the fried milk, crispy cornflake-dusted milk balls that deliver a little saltiness, served with sweet cream ice cream and salted fudge. For an easy night of making no dining decisions, you can order the chef’s ten-course tasting menu for two or a seven-course selection of core menu items. There’s even a vegetarian option that spans umami-filled dishes like a marinated avocado topped with yuzu kosho and four types of mushrooms with crispy rice in a hot clay pot. Surrounding brutalist architecture inspired Uchi DC’s location, which anchors downtown sleek office tower 17xM. A mottled green marble bar stretches across the entryway and plenty of small modernist touches in the sprawling dining room. New York-based Islyn Studio has helped to create customized Uchi locations across the country, with the Miami location having a more tropical feel, for example. Those details in D.C. include minimalist wood booths upholstered with black and red leather, a wraparound 14-seat sushi bar, and plenty of warmly lit corners surrounded by orange-hued lamps. “We bring a lot of influence from the city, the community,” general manager Kamar Adeniyi tells Eater. He’s been working for Hai Hospitality in Dallas for six years and relocated to D.C. to run the new location. The ethos at the center of Hai Hospitality is collaboration, which extends from the front of house, with managers checking in on diners multiple times during a meal and helping to clear plates, all the way to the kitchen. “Anybody can put up a special or put up a dish,” Adeniyi says. They encourage anyone that works there, from a bartender to a dishwasher, to pitch ideas for local signature dishes and he’s excited to see what DMV talent will bring to the restaurant. Adeniyi stuck to tempura rolls and other non-raw sushi when he first started working at Hai Hospitality, but he credits Uchi’s crudos, like the hama chili and delicate flounder with crispy quinoa in the hirame usuzukuri, for converting him into a fish lover. Drennan has also watched the restaurant open up American diners, starting with Texans, to classic Japanese food, with people first coming in for tableside sizzling wagyu on a hot rock and finding themselves trying firefly squid or sliced abalone for the first time. “You won’t know until you try,” he quips. The 18-seat entryway bar, surrounded by cozy booth seating, will host a happy hour daily from 4 to 6 p.m. with $10 cocktails, nigiri sets for under $10, and a nine-course tasting menu for two for $120. Classics like an Old Fashioned or a margarita are riffed on, with plenty of Japanese sake and flavors like lychee and yuzu making their way into cocktails. A green Negroni that adapts Midori and watermelon botanicals to balance the bitter drink is a signature developed specifically for D.C. The new Uchi will open at 4 p.m. every day, staying open till 10 p.m. Sunday through Thursday and extending till 11 p.m. on Friday and Saturday. Reservations are already available on SevenRooms. —Tierney Plumb contributed to this report ...read more read less