In Japan, reputation is everything,…for sushi, anyway. A sushi restaurant’s reputation will be based entirely on the quality of its sushi. High end proprietors accept this and, in turn, place bids for the freshest, choice fish at places like Tokyo’s “Tsukiji Fish Market”. Because they know that their sushi is fresher and of a higher quality than anyone else around, they, with pride, charge a premium.

There’s a steadfast correlation between price and quality in Japan.

In San Diego, that just doesn’t exist. In our town, the more established the place does not mean the better the sushi. Instead, it’s a crapshoot.

And so, with San Diego sushi, you find quality in unlikely places. Packaged sushi can be worthwhile. Vons sushi, for example, is pretty good. The Panda Express salmon bento is worth a taste.

Also, less established places can be hidden gems.

Take Fugu’s, for example. It’s a relatively obscure Japanese restaurant in La Jolla Village that opened last December.

The exterior doesn’t stand out in any way—It takes up a store front in a building also occupied by a yogurt shop, hair salon, and Radio Shack—and the interior lacks a bit of ambience. The décor, for example, is a touch redundant. Ringing the dining area are thirteen paintings of the same abstract design (a blossom?), with only color tones varying from painting to painting.

But never mind that. It’s the food I came to write about.

Fugu’s began offering an all-you-can-eat lunch buffet last week. At $5.90 per person, it’s one of the great steals in the city. I ate there twice last week and can report that the food quality surpasses that of any other Asian buffet I’ve had in San Diego.

What the buffet lacks in selection, it makes up for in quality. There are only six to eight entrees each day, along with salad greens and a soup of the day.

The mixed greens comprise fresh arugula, spinach, and lettuce. (Note, “fresh”. No limpid, browned leaves here.) It comes with a Japanese dressing (wafu).

The miso soup was the best miso I’ve had in San Diego. I’ve been to other, “prestigious” restaurants in San Diego where the miso was likely made from an instant mix. In fact, at one La Jolla place, I heard a Japanese customer remark disdainfully to her dinner partner, “It’s definitely instant. I’m one-hundred percent sure.”

At Fugu’s, one taste of the miso soup brought me back to my time in Japan. I had a flashback to the sushiyas and izakayas around Tokyo. It was that good. The broth had a rich, full-bodied taste with a buttery undertone.

As I walked up for my second bowl, I asked the waiter—who, it turns out, is the owner—how the soup was made. “My wife makes it using some special ingredients,” he said.

“So, it’s not from a mix?” I pressed.

“No, no. She makes it from scratch.”

The sushi is what clinches high marks for Fugu’s. The nigiri salmon was fresh—which was more of a relief than a given in this town. It smelled and looked appetizing. The rice had a slight vinegar taste and added complexity to the smooth, smoky flavor of salmon. Each piece of fish was tender and broke easily in the mouth.

A little bit about smell: follow your nose.

If you walk into a place and you can smell fish, then the sushi won’t be good. Head for the hills (in this case, Mt. Soledad) and don’t look back. There’s no excuse for a fishy smell at a sushi restaurant.

If you walk in and can’t smell anything, stick around. The chef is probably keeping a clean kitchen and adhering to a strict product freshness regimen.

Fugu's had no fishy scent and the food was very good. The ambience could have been better. But at $5.90 a head, I have nothing to complain about. And neither will you.