My spouse and I
dined at Kodama for lunch on a Sunday afternoon in late July 2018. Kodama is
open daily from 12:00 noon until either 10:30/11:00/11:30 pm, depending on the
night of the week. The restaurant also offers delivery and takeout during those
same hours.
Kodama is located in
Midtown West/Hell’s Kitchen/Theatre District on West 45th Street
(between 8th and 9th Avenues), across the street from the
Al Hirschfeld Theatre (which is currently showing Kinky Boots). Kodama’s
management also operates a more casual counter-service outlet called Black
Sushi, located on 8th Avenue (near the corner of West 45th
Street), and connected to Kodama by way of a back hallway. (The restaurants
share the same restrooms, which are located on the casual-dining side.) The
restaurant’s owner is a Korean-born chef who came to the US in order to open a Japanese
restaurant on Long Island and a sushi-catering business in Manhattan. He later
took ownership of Kodama, which at 25+ years old, is one of the oldest Japanese
restaurants in NYC.
Kodama gets its name
from tree-inhabiting spirits in Japanese folklore. The interior space of Kodama
includes a drinks bar (which was unoccupied when we visited), a sushi bar
(which was very popular), and stand-alone blonde-wood tables. Hanging lanterns,
prints, and Japanese memorabilia decorate the ceiling and walls.
Kodama serves Asian cuisine, including both cold and hot and raw and
cooked selections. If you don’t eat sushi, sashimi, or rolls, rest assured that
you can get other entrees such as teriyaki (which arrives on a hot stone plate),
rice, curry, noodle, and tempura dishes. One unique thing that Kodama serves is
black rice, a more nutritional version found in Korea, Japan, and Southern
China and available for only a small upcharge. To start, we shared some steamed
dumplings. As our entrees, we ordered one sushi sampler and an order of tempura
(which included a side of white rice). Dessert (some sort of berries atop a
mascarpone custard) was yummy, although it was still frozen a smidge. My spouse
enjoyed a Sapporo from Kodama’s full bar, but I only ordered an iced tea,
although I was pleased when it was served in a sort of Ball jar mug with a
decorative metal cutout lid. The sushi rolls named after Broadway shows (Kinky
Boots, Mamma Mia, Spider-Man) seemed to be popular.
We enjoyed our lunch in the Theatre District, where we often
struggle to find a decent restaurant before a performance; we found our answer
at Kodama.
