#221: Shokunin

The Bar

Shokunin. 1009 E 6th St, Austin, TX 78702

Visited 12/22/2025 @ 9pm.

The Drink

Sushi By Scratch Private Label Sake. $13.

For whatever reason, sake is generally not something I ever really think about or have the urge to grab a bottle of. I have the irreplaceable Texas Sake to thank for giving me a more in-depth exploration of the subtleties of sake beyond "it's half of a sake bomb", but I would still not claim to be an expert on all the varieties of the venerable rice wine. Luckily for me, sake snobbery does not appear to be much of a thing here in the same way that wine snobbery is, and even I could tell that this was good stuff. This is the latter half of a bottle of sake from the group who owns the restaurant; after taking an initial round of toasts, we got glasses of ice-cold Kirin from a special kegerator to drop our second helpings in for shooting purposes. I will be honest that this was neither the first round of drinks we had this evening nor the last, so please don't ask me for detailed tasting notes, but rest assured that it was perfect, as was everything else that we had.

The Crew

Ashley, Lars, Aaron, Mike.

Notes

Shokunin, which had only been open since Halloween, is the Japanese word for "master artisan", and it deserves its moniker, although I do mourn the loss of the former occupant, the excellent Italian joint Gelateria Gemelli. Shokunin is a project of the Sushi By Scratch restaurant group, who I learned are also behind a few other high-end establishments such as NADC Burger next door. Japanese restaurants in the US occupy an interesting place in the culinary landscape; whereas in Japan they obviously have restaurants which span the entire budgetary spectrum, here the absence of the $4 lunch bowls so beloved there is due to our culture of NIMBYism and regulatory failure, which means that almost all Japanese food you'll find in a city like Austin is going to be high-end stuff. This of course is a running theme with essentially all new restaurants on Sixth Street in particular, but especially with a less-common cuisine like Japanese. 

Shokunin is not quite Jiro Dreams of Sushi (though keep in mind that Jiro himself might not be around for too much longer), but it's definitely aiming at a higher price point than Ramen Tatsu-Ya or Domo Alley-Gato. Now, as I alluded to above, we had all had a LOT to drink (at the delightful show the Mutt-Cracker, specifically) before visiting, and we were in an exceptionally Dealer's Choice-friendly mood, so my accounting of the food is not quite up to my usual exacting standards, but rest assured that everything we were served was incredible. This is the kind of place where you can put your drunken dining fate entirely in your server's hands and be fully confident that you will have an excellent meal.