Miu Fish

Alright, I know some of you might laugh, some might criticize and some might just roll your eyes and want to stop reading right now.  However, bear with me here.  I feel that eating one type of cuisine (even though it can be diverse) can catch up to you.  If you look at your dining behaviour in your own town, it generally won't be the same things over and over again.  Therefore, we just had to go eat something else for dinner while in Pisa.  So don't laugh when we went to AYCE sushi at Miu Fish.  Just like in Rome, this place is Chinese-run, but I guess we had to see if it was any good.

Looking over the huge menu, we selected a bunch of items including the Tatare Special, Tiger Venere, Tris Tartare and Carpaccio di Pesce Misto.  Surprisingly, the fish quality was rather decent with a nice sheen and fresh smell.  Texturally, it ate well and the carpaccio was especially buttery.  As for the purple rice in the maki sushi, it was a little soft, but not mushy.  It still had a bit of chewiness.

Off to our next set of dishes, we had the Ebi Tempura, Unagi Nigiri, Gio Spicy Tuna and Gio Spicy Salmone.  Unlike the one we had in Rome, the ebi tempura was solid with a crispy and light batter.  The ebi itself was cold water buttery.  Unagi was pretty typical being soft and fatty with just enough unagi sauce.  Sushi rice was acceptable with a moist chewiness.  The tuna and salmon flowers were akin to the fish we had with the previous dishes.

With a variety of Sushi e Sashimi, we chose the 20-piece platter.  As you can see in the picture, we found salmone, pesce bianco, tuna and ebi nigiri as well as the same in sashimi.  Also on the plate was Salmone Gunkan and a Miura Roll.  As you can see so far, even though this was AYCE, the food was prepared carefully and presented neatly.  Again, the fish quality was good and hence, the nigiri and sashimi ate well.

Our next 3 dishes were a bit of a mishmash of things including the Gamberetti Sale e Pepe, New Chirashi Sake and Gambero Pistacchio.  Yes, the first dish was a Chinese one with fried salt and pepper shrimp.  Hey, it was good, crispy with meaty shrimp and lots of flavour.  The next dish was essentially thinly sliced salmon on top of sushi rice.  On the bottom, the last one was a salmon flower with cream cheese on top and pistachios.  Interesting, but ate quite well. 

We actually had quite a few dishes that were rather similar.  That was the case of the Ikura Special, as it was essentially like the gio spicy salmone except with ikura on top (and not being spicy) with some ponzu dressing.  The kids love Salmone Sashimi, so we got an order of that.  Look how vibrant it is.  Nothing much to say about the Ebi Nigiri as we already had that in the platter.  Last in this round was the Spicy Salmone Roll.  This was deep fried and topped with spicy salmon and spicy mayo.  Quite saucy and crunchy.

One of our favourite dishes was the Grigliata Mista comprised of filetto di branzino, gamberoni and totani grigliati.  So the grilled prawn was sweet and meaty while the branzino was moist and flaky.  The squid was a bit chewy, but tender enough to eat.  Also got some Salmone and Tuna Tataki coated in sesame seeds and dressed in olive oil.  Mild-tasting, but again, the fish quality was good.

Last set of dishes included Manzo Piccante con Verdure and Spaghetti di Soia Vegetariani.  Back to the Chinese dishes, the spicy beef was quite good with tender slices and a tangy spicy sauce.  The mung bean noodles were chewy and well-seasoned and accompanied by crisp veggies.  Overall, this was a rather surprising meal as it was more than acceptable especially since it was AYCE and located in Pisa of all places.  Worth a visit if you aren't into pasta, pizza, steak or sandwiches anymore.

The Good:
- Solid food quality
- Actually prepared well
- Reasonably-priced

The Bad:
- Some creative liberties take here, but we didn't mind it
- Some confusion on which dishes we ordered