Way beyond kim chee

I never thought I’d see the day when Vegas became a hotbed for Japanese and Korean cooking, but that day has arrived. Two new entries help make the case.

Henderson’s Kaizen, aka Kaizen Fusion Roll & Sushi, is a small, winsome place where the guy behind the sushi counter shouts “irrasshaimase,” Japanese for welcome, at all the people who come through the door. Like the majority of sushi chefs in this town, he hails from Korea. It reminds me of high school, when everybody wanted to be from Liverpool, like John, Paul, George and Ringo.

The difference is that here, these guys can back it up. Kaizen serves a terrific variety of hand rolls and cooked dishes, sushi and sashimi, all from the handbook of Americanized Japanese dishes.

You know what I mean. Anything that has mayonnaise on it, for instance, is about as close to real Japanese food as Abner Doubleday’s ancestors were to the Japanese court. That means I pass on the stuff like Dynamite Roll, but go instead for hot appetizers such as crispy rice with spicy tuna. This concoction, made with finely minced, sushi-quality tuna and jalapeño, piled onto squares of crispy, toasted rice, is just plain addictive.

Another of the best dishes here is a fusion of Japanese and Korean sensibilities, the Korean BBQ roll, for which short ribs are broiled in the kitchen, in their traditional bath of sesame oil and garlic, and then brought to the sushi man to be wrapped around a roll of vinegar rice laced with avocado and cucumber. It’s a beautiful marriage.

Nigiri, clumps of rice topped with the usual-suspect cuts of raw fish, is exemplary here, especially toro (fatty tuna belly), Kobe beef (which seems almost too rich to eat more than a single piece of) and uni (that’s sea urchin to you, fella), a creature with an iodine tang the average chemist would identify from a block away.

Start a meal with a dish of edamame, boiled, salted green soybeans that you pop out of their shells and into your mouth, to create a thirst, and hunger will follow naturally. Tuna sashimi with fresh garlic ponzu sauce is a good starter, and quirky rolls abound, although nothing could induce me to try the Philadelphia roll, smoked salmon and cream cheese on rice with asparagus and avocado.

Someday, I’m going to open a Jewish deli, and get my revenge. Maybe I’ll put miso on somebody’s corned beef sandwich.

Kaizen

10271 S. Eastern Ave., Henderson. 492-0216.

Suggested dishes: edamame, $3.75; crispy rice with spicy tuna, $8.95; Korean BBQ roll, $11.75; Kobe beef sushi, MP.

Honey Pig

The elaborate meals served at Honey Pig, a new California import at the western edge of Chinatown, represent a new wrinkle for our Korean restaurants. Meals are cooked on a giant metal brazier, called pan’chan, by a hard-working waitress, who also has her hands full with the side dishes. This is the actual barbecuing, and at the end, the fried rice is cooked on the same grill. Here’s how it works.

You’ll first order one of the meats, such as pork belly or short ribs of beef, and then await the side dishes, which include rectangles of marinated bean curd, yellow bean sprouts and about five other choices, including the notorious kim chee, stinky fermented cabbage.

Ah, but this time, there is a twist. Your waitress is going to broil the cabbage along with the meat, as well as a sliced onion and one large button mushroom. Go ahead and nibble on the sides while you are waiting for the meat to cook. It takes up to 15 minutes.

The waitress will then bring a bowl of water concealing thinly sliced rounds of radish, and advise you to use them to wrap the individual pieces of meat after they are sizzling and done. There is also a trio of condiments: two red chili sauces, one based on fermented bean, and a soft brown powder, also extracted from some kind of bean. The plot thickens.

A bowl of delicious salad is then proffered, containing some kind of lettuce and green onions, finely shredded, and dressed with delicious sesame-oil vinaigrette. Then the rice is tossed onto the brazier, combining with the kim chee, the onions, the browned bits of meat and whatever else has been left there. When it forms a crust, the waitress will spoon it off, into your waiting bowl.

You have the option of ordering something from the specials board, such as the chicken ginseng soup, which is reputed to increase body heat and give you potency. There are many cuts of beef and pork to choose from. The endgame is a bowl of shikkei, a flavorful rice punch. Other than the occasional slice of persimmon, this is about as close to dessert as Korean cuisine gets. I’m not going into the sociological implications.

Honey Pig

4725 W. Spring Mountain Road. 876-0711.

Suggested dishes: pork belly, $23.95; short ribs of beef, $21.95; chicken ginseng soup, $11.95,