Tona Sushi: contemporary Japanese with a twist.

AuthorBiton, Adva
PositionUB Digital

Tony Chen, owner and executive chef of Tona Sushi in Ogden, always knew he wanted to own a Japanese restaurant. He moved from Ogden to San Francisco thinking he would pursue a career in architecture, but his dream of working with Japanese cuisine never left him. He'd started making Japanese food at the age of 16, and even while he worked at an architectural firm, he continued working part-time at a local Japanese restaurant. In 2004, his love of combining different flavors led him and his wife (and now restaurant co-owner), Tina Yu, back to Ogden to open his dream restaurant: Tona Sushi.

Yu says her husband's passion for unique flavor combinations is what makes Tona so successful. "The things we offer are more of a contemporary and progressive take on a Japanese restaurant," she says. "We don't always just do sushi rolls. We like to incorporate ingredients from all over the world into our dishes while still keeping the Japanese influence."

Many examples of Chen's creativity are off-menu "open secrets" that pass from patron to patron by word of mouth. A popular favorite is the Green Globe, which arrives as an orb of thinly-sliced avocado with a tobiko caviar crown and a citrus-soy glaze, hiding an interior of crab salad and spicy tuna. Or ask for the Sushi Cupcake, a single-bite treat consisting of an edible seaweed cupcake liner containing sushi rice, tempura shrimp, sweet soy, tobiko caviar, slices of avocado and a bit of tomato. There's...

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