Choose Maru on movie night

If you’re looking to grab dinner before a movie at NCG, there are a lot of nearby options, but in my opinion, few of them stand out. Thankfully, right down the road is Maru Sushi & Grill, where you can enjoy a light meal that leaves room for popcorn. Or, as I did prior to my last NCG trip, you can make a very different choice.

I have long appreciated Maru for its creative rolls and fresh ingredients. Is it cheap? No. But for the quality of the food, I think it’s worth it, especially when you can basically get two meals in one with dishes like the chicken katsu. 

The katsu comes with your choice of soup or salad, which is a much more difficult choice at a Japanese restaurant than it is at other restaurants. Given the heaviness of what I’d ordered, I went with the salad, which was vibrant and fresh, topped with edamame and that addictive ginger dressing that I can’t help slurping out of the gorgeous bowl when I’m done. 

That’s another thing I love about Maru: Its dishware consists of lovely, handcrafted-looking ceramics that make the meal feel special. My chicken katsu was served on a beautiful plate, much bigger than your average plate for all it had to hold. There was a mound of rice, a pile of ribboned red cabbage, slices of neon-yellow pickled daikon radish and pieces of golden-brown chicken breast. The meal was so big that an ancillary bowl was needed to hold the curry. 

Usually, katsu curry is served all in one bowl, with most everything named above in a big pile. In this case, though, there was a lot more opportunity to create different combinations of the meal’s elements. The panko-fried chicken was perfectly crispy and not at all greasy, the curry gravy was warming and silky, and the richness of both could be cut with the fresh cabbage and bright, acidic daikon. The best addition to the plate was a side of tonkatsu sauce, which is sort of like a Japanese barbecue sauce. It was sweet and tangy and absolutely incredible with the chicken. 

This is definitely one of my favorite plates in Lansing, especially because the portion size allows me to enjoy it all over again the next day, or maybe an hour or so later in the movie theater.