Minato Herzliya: A Tokyo Sushi Dynasty Hidden in a Tech Courtyard

The rice arrives at body temperature, loosely packed, still holding the faint warmth of the chef's palm. A clean cut of red tuna rests across it, neat enough to show the grain of the fish. Around you the room is hushed, the loudest sound the soft knock of a knife against a wooden board behind the counter. A warm wet towel was set at your place a moment ago. This is Minato on a weekday evening, a Japanese sushi bar tucked into an office courtyard in Herzliya Pituach, where the cooking carries far more history than the address would ever suggest. The room feels like a held breath, the kitchen calm, the pace unhurried, the chefs working with the quiet rhythm of people who have done this for decades.

Minato opened in Herzliya in 2011 as the younger sibling of the original Minato Sushi Bar, established in 2004 near the Caesarea interchange by chef Matan Rosenthal and partner Kobi Ninio. The Herzliya branch took on its own identity from the start: a sushi bar and izakaya rather than a roadside stop, and a Bassari kitchen rather than the dairy operation that still defines Caesarea. At the counter is sushi master Aki Tamura, a fourth generation chef from Tokyo's Minato ward, where his family has run a restaurant for more than ninety years. He has lived in Israel for around three decades and holds firmly to Japanese technique despite the constraints a kosher kitchen places on him. Matan Rosenthal, trained in both Japanese and French cuisines, leads the meat and izakaya side. The discipline of both hands shows on every plate.