New to the Lou: Ai, No Ar­ti­fi­cial In­tel­li­gence

I can’t be­lieve I’ve never touched on my new found love and ap­pre­ci­a­tion for a clas­sic Japan­ese cui­sine, SUSHI!

As a kid, I was never one to try new things. I’ll have chicken ten­ders, mac and cheese, or straw­ber­ries, please; It was­n’t un­til I turned around 18, or about my se­nior year of high school, that I fi­nally started to branch out and try a few new things here and there. 

I started off small. I tried lemon­ade for the first time at the county fair and man my life was changed for­ever. I re­mem­ber that piv­otal mo­ment in my picky-eater ca­reer, when I be­gan get­ting ex­cited about try­ing new things. 

Sushi is a new dish that I re­cently gave a try. I had al­ways wanted to try it, but thought for sure that it would­n’t be for me. I’m so glad I pushed my­self to try it be­cause now it’s one of my fa­vorite din­ners to grab!

Last night, my boy Sky­walker Mann and I tried Sushi Ai, lo­cated in Clay­ton, Mis­souri. But don’t worry, that’s only one of five lo­ca­tions in the St. Louis area. 

The rec­om­men­da­tion came from a fel­low Paw­Print class­mate, Liz San­ti­maw, a se­nior Busi­ness Ad­min­is­tra­tion stu­dent. Liz said “I love Sushi Ai”, and I trust her judge­ment so I knew it was worth a try. 

Photo cour­tesy of Mad­die Hill. This photo is from the Sushi Ai lo­ca­tion at 471 Lafayette Cen­ter Drive in Man­ches­ter.

Walker got the all you can eat sushi deal that they of­fer, which was $23.99. They have over 40 rolls to choose from. He went with the Snow White roll, the Vol­cano roll, and the Amer­i­can Dream roll. On a lit­tle more mel­low side, I went with the clas­sic Crab roll and the Shrimp Tem­pura roll. 

What sets Sushi Ai apart is that all of the sushi is pre­pared in house, with the chefs in view for the cus­tomers. This cre­ates an ex­pe­ri­ence for cus­tomers, and makes the restau­rant feel au­then­tic. 

When you ar­rive, you are handed a pa­per menu and a pen, with a list of all the rolls and com­bi­na­tions they of­fer. Once you de­cide on the rolls you want to or­der, you write a check­mark or X next to it. Your server will come and take your pa­per menu, which they then give to the chefs. 

Photo cour­tesy of Mad­die Hill. Pic­tured from left to right: Amer­i­can Dream Roll, Snow White Roll, Vol­cano Roll, Shrimp Tem­pura Roll and Spicy Crab Roll.

Walker says “the all you can eat sushi is an ab­solute steal for the price”. He is sure right, when you choose a min­i­mum of three rolls, you have es­sen­tially got the bang for your buck in the all you can eat. How­ever, Sushi Ai does charge for any un­eaten pieces of sushi, up to $1.00 per piece. 

If this write-up can en­cour­age you to do any­thing, it’s to branch out and ex­plore new foods, no mat­ter how scary or un­ap­pe­tiz­ing they may seem! You know what they say, you never know un­til you try. 

Here is Sushi Ai’s ex­tended menu, and web­site to learn more.