Bar Japonais had only been open about a year and a half when it shut down for a rebrand. The 14th Street restaurant was initially billed as a French-Japanese izakaya with a lot of fusion dishes and limited sushi. But it turned out the main thing diners wanted was, in fact, sushi, especially after th e restaurant brought in chef Masaaki “Uchi” Uchino, the Sushi Nakazawa alum behind Kiyomi omakase counter. “We got to the point where we were pretty much fully Japanese and rather than explaining the French aspect to the restaurant, we wanted to just become fully Japanese and lean in on that direction,” says co-owner Dean Mosones, who’s also behind French-Chinese restaurant Bar Chinois. So, the dining room closed in December and reopened this week as Katsumi, a vibe-y Japanese restaurant with expanded sushi offerings, new cocktails, and a lounge area with weekend DJs. The owners wanted to give Katsumi “more personality” than its predecessor. Photograph by Scott Suchman. The new menu still has plenty of fusion, but with a more global range of influences. Sashimi and other raw dishes span from salmon aji amarillo with passionfruit and scallion oil to a beef tenderloin carpaccio with creamy Cipriani-style sauce. You’ll find traditional nigiri, but also more maki, such as the “sour cream and onion crunch” roll with caviar, black porgy, and potato crunchies. Katsumi’s menu includes more rolls and new hot dishes. Photograph by Scott Suchman. Uchino previously offered an omakase option at Bar Japonais, but that’s paused for now. The chef will be opening a standalone location of his omakase counter Kiyomi downtown this year (it was previously located in the Square food hall). Meanwhile, Katsumi doesn’t have a dedicated sushi counter. “We really want people to appreciate omakase for the way that it’s supposed to be done,” Mosones says.  “So we just took that off for the time being to rethink how we can make it better.” Soupless noodles with chashu. Photograph by Scott Suchman. Chef Jhony Bautista, formerly of Kappo and Rooster Owl, helped to round out the menu with new hot dishes, including soupless soba noodles with pork chashu and lobster tail koganeyaki with golden egg sauce. Some holdovers from Bar Japonais’s menu include chicken karaage and gyoza. A matcha strawberry cocktail with strawberry Pocky stick. Photograph by Scott Suchman. Former Seranata beverage director Andra “AJ” Johnson is Katsumi’s general manager and has helped revamp the beverage menu as well. Cocktails are infused with Japanese ingredients. They include the “Wakana Gimlet” with koji-fermented apple gin and shiso tincture, and a take on an espresso martini using Japanese Haku vodka, shochu, nitro cold brew, and Okinawa sugar. Wines are no longer exclusively French—”we like our wines and our drinks a little funky, so [there’s] some unexpected things people probably won’t see on a lot of other menus,” Mosones says. You’ll still find a wide selection of sakes by the glass plus a handful of Japanese beers. A lounge area at the front of Katsumi will feature weekend DJs. Photograph by Scott Suchman. The dining room also got a moodier makeover with red walls, neon accents, and Japanese-inspired murals, including one of a geisha. They cut the dining seating by half to create a lounge area at the front of the restaurant with sofas and lounge chairs. Expect local DJs on Fridays and Saturdays. “We felt like the space needed more personality,” Mosones says.The post Bar Japonais Rebrands as Katsumi With More Sushi and Lounge Vibes first appeared on Washingtonian. ...read more read less