Uchiko is the Houston outpost of the Uchi family, built on Tyson Cole's original non-traditional Japanese concept but bent toward fire and char rather than staying purely raw and clean. The restaurant sits on Post Oak Blvd in Houston's Westside and is part of Hai Hospitality, which operates Uchi and Uchiko locations across several cities.
Rusty Hicks runs the kitchen as chef de cuisine, working alongside head sushi chef Vicki Rodpai.
The menu splits between raw and hearth-cooked plates: toro nuta with bluefin tuna, blueberry, and lemon dashi; a lobster koviche with tiger's milk, sunchoke, and grapefruit; gyutoro nigiri made from 72-hour short rib; hearth-roasted lobster with tom kha and umeboshi butter; and dry-aged zabuton with charred snow pea leaves. Desserts, including a s'mores plate with torched marshmallow and black sesame, have built a following of their own.
The dining room features custom lighting by Nathan Warbach, hand-carved booths from SRG Millwork, and a large-scale 1970s abstract expressionist painting by Marlene Matalon.
Rusty Hicks runs the kitchen as chef de cuisine, working alongside head sushi chef Vicki Rodpai.
The menu splits between raw and hearth-cooked plates: toro nuta with bluefin tuna, blueberry, and lemon dashi; a lobster koviche with tiger's milk, sunchoke, and grapefruit; gyutoro nigiri made from 72-hour short rib; hearth-roasted lobster with tom kha and umeboshi butter; and dry-aged zabuton with charred snow pea leaves. Desserts, including a s'mores plate with torched marshmallow and black sesame, have built a following of their own.
The dining room features custom lighting by Nathan Warbach, hand-carved booths from SRG Millwork, and a large-scale 1970s abstract expressionist painting by Marlene Matalon.