Uroko.

Uroko

The chef hand roll is fatty hamachi with wasabi butter and crispy quinoa, off a temaki list of fewer than two dozen.1

Why go

Masazumi Saio worked the sushi bar at Uchi from 2003 before opening this counter in Springdale General with Kayo and Takehiro Asazu of Komé.1 The temaki list splits into raw, vegetarian and cooked, so hamachi and spicy tuna sit alongside barbecue eel and shrimp tempura.1 On Friday and Saturday evenings the kitchen runs a forty-five-minute omakase of about twelve dishes, which is a deliberately short answer to the long tasting menu.1 Nicolai McCrary rates it 7.7 for The Infatuation.2

Order this / avoid

• The omakase, if you can be there on a Friday or Saturday evening.1
• The fatty hamachi hand roll with wasabi butter and crispy quinoa. The butter carries the fat and the quinoa is the texture the rice does not give you.1
• Barbecue eel off the cooked section, or spicy tuna off the raw one.1
• Avoid: arriving midweek expecting the tasting. It runs two nights.

What locals & experts say

• James Beard Foundation, 2025: Takehiro Asazu and Masazumi Saio were Best Chef: Texas semifinalists for Uroko. That award belongs to the cooks, and neither advanced to finalist.4
• Masazumi Saio on what he was aiming for: quick, fresh, tasty, and not too expensive.1
• Nicolai McCrary rates it 7.7 for The Infatuation, page dated 17 January 2023.2

Good to know

• Price: about $60 a head for the omakase when CultureMap wrote it up in 2019, and I have not found a newer figure.1
• Small room, few seats, inside the Springdale General complex, so allow time to find the right building.
• Hygiene: no finding. Austin Public Health scores the counter at 1023 Springdale Rd 93 on 22 January 2026, with 80, 91, 94, 92 and 89 behind it back to February 2024. Nothing below the city's failing line of 70.3

Jeff's take (his words)

• Note: "james beard chef semifinalist 2025"

Verdict

should-visit — Book it if you want one of the two omakase nights. Any other evening, walk up and eat a few hand rolls at the counter, which is the cheaper way to test the fish.