CD: Diversified dining: Unique dishes, tableside cooking and mariachi bands

JULY 2, 2009

JORDAN NOVET

Eating out in Columbus and Starkville is less and less about wolfing down Southern staples.

Three recently established restaurants in the cities offer food or experiences that may be new to people.

At Umi Steakhouse and Grill, which moved from a location on Stark Road to a strip mall on Highway 12 in Starkville in May, diners who eat in can watch a chef flip and push food around on a stainless steel grill before their eyes. The style is known as hibachi.

At the restaurant’s old location, the selection was limited to sushi, said its owner, Billy Wang, who is a longtime sushi chef. Business had picked up so much in almost four years, and Wang was considering moving to a bigger location. Toward the end of the time Umi was on Stark Road, people began suggesting Wang expand his offerings to include food from hibachi grills.

He heeded the suggestion. Now the availability of hibachi in Starkville is the talk of the town, according to some recent customers.

“Everyone’s always talking about it, and we’ve been wanting to go. It’s just always so busy,” said Kelly McCollum, a junior public relations major at Mississippi State University who, along with a friend, got her first exposure to Umi’s hibachi grills on Tuesday night.

Read complete article at Commercial Dispatch.