Tastemaker: Mustang Wendy’s Crispy Chicken Sushi Bowl
Chef Wendy Wagner, owner of Mustang Wendy’s in Harbor Springs, recently got the idea of introducing sushi to her restaurant’s menu but had a tough time figuring out how to properly execute the dish without having an experienced sushi chef on her team.
“One of the challenges of making good sushi is finding talent that can properly roll it,” she said. “So we did some research and decided to do a sushi bowl instead, which is actually more of a Hawaiian influence.”
Taking that idea and — pardon us — rolling with it, Wagner borrowed a little inspiration from one Colonel Sanders of the Kentucky Fried Chicken franchise and crafted her own sushi bowl entrée, one that started as a special and proved so popular it’s just made its official full-time menu debut.
Wagner starts with a bed of tender sushi rice in a bowl, arranges panko-breaded fried chicken pieces, cucumber slices, and scallions on top, and then garnishes with a sweet-spicy sesame-ginger dressing and chipotle aioli.
“The Colonel ain’t got nothin’ on us,” Wagner said. Sure to, er … bowl you over, the multi-cultural combo of textures and flavors in Wagner’s crispy chicken sushi bowl is available now for $12 (dinner menu only) at Mustang Wendy’s, 129 E. Bay St., in downtown Harbor Springs. mustangwendys.com or (231) 242-4810.