The story
Sushi Sho is a Japanese sushi counter at Upplandsgatan 45 in Stockholm, and it holds a Michelin 1 Star (2026) for its high quality cooking. The room is small, so the chef works directly in front of every guest.
Sushi Sho serves a single omakase built from the chef's daily selection of nigiri and small dishes. Twelve seats line the bar, and four more sit in a sofa beside its short end. Guests at the bar receive each course at the same time, handed over by the chef. The menu follows the season and the produce available, so it can change from one day to the next.
The White Guide review describes Sushi Sho as an Edomae bar, a style that serves pressed rice topped with fish brushed with soy. Arctic char, Danish yellowtail, halibut and turbot appear on the counter in this way. Earlier courses include hamachi in soy and mirin, monkfish liver poached in soy with yuzu, and oshizushi wrapped in nori. The meal ends with raw tuna belly topped with caviar.
The same review notes that sake suits the meal better than most wines, with a cool junmai ginjo to start and an unpasteurised sake alongside the monkfish liver. The restaurant also keeps a wine list for guests who prefer it.
Recognition
Ambience
Details
History
The biting autumn wind ceases abruptly as we’re sucked into one of Stockholm’s most packed eateries. Sushi Sho: the tiny restaurant widely known for making next-level sushi in a setting as bare as it is intimate. The place is packed; we quickly stow our jackets and manoeuver into our seats at the bar, between chatty guests. There’s eighteen of us here: twelve around the bar counter, four elevated seats in the window bay and two people huddled by the beer fridge which is halfway into the kitchen. Let the sho(w) commence. This is an omakase, meaning that you put SEK 685 into Sho’s skilled hands and trust that the kitchen will only serve the best of what’s in season. Drinks are up to you, and even if the blackboard tempts us with ten-odd champagnes from nature-nurturing producers, sake seems a given – we begin with a cool junmai ginjo and thirst-quenching Japanese lager. The first course sets the standard delightfully high: velvety hamachi swaddled in soy mirin warms our autumn-chilled senses. Tepid Swedish octopus and French abalone with fresh wasabi are bouncingly fresh, just made, and have a delicious balance between sweet and salty. Monkfish liver (ankimo) poached in soy and spiced with yuzu is perfected with an unpasteurised sake, where fatty, acidic and spicy melt on your tongue. Pressed sushi (oshizushi) wrapped in crackling nori and served with mackerel, shiso and sesame is crisp, acidic, salty and stunningly good. Eating raw fish over rice has not always been a given in Japanese culture. Sushi, which means ‘sour’ in Japanese, was originally a way of preserving and fermenting fish. Eventually rice was added to the process, and soon vinegar too. It was in 18th-century Tokyo that raw fish then began being served over rice in the city’s edo taverns (edomae), which catered for people who were short of time and would drop in for a quick but filling meal. Sushi Sho presents itself as an Edomae bar, and if you’ve been to Tokyo you’ll recognise its nigiri servings. With a light touch, a ball of rice is squeezed to perfection, while skilled knife handlers slice Arctic char, Danish yellowtail, halibut and turbot and brush the pieces with soy before serving them on their rice across the counter. The crescendo is an extra course – raw tuna belly with caviar, as delicious as it is costly. Sushi Sho gives us a show full of craftsmanship, attitude, knowledge and passion. Elegant, warm, heartfelt and so good that eating yourself full almost seems a bad idea.
High quality cooking
Location
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