Gary Lin – Memphis Flyer

Jimmy Sinh

Sushi Jimmi — the man not the restaurant — will become chef/kitchen manager at Saltwater Crab.

Jimmy “Sushi Jimmi” Sinh, owner of the now defunct Sushi Jimmi Asian fusion restaurant at 2895 Poplar, will become chef/kitchen manager at Saltwater Crab beginning January 15th, says owner Gary Lin.

Saltwater Crab, which opened in July, serves a range of fare from seafood to steaks. It also served sushi. “I took sushi away and people complained,” Lin says. “They wanted more sushi. I needed somebody hard working in the kitchen to take it to a different level.”

Why Sinh? “A lot of people in the whole city know him,” Lin says. And, he added, “All my servers, bartenders, know him. They wanted me to bring him back.”

Sinh initially closed Sushi Jimmi on May 23rd, saying he wanted to spend more time with his family. He said he put too much money ($250,000) into the restaurant, though he says it was successful. He planned to move to Florida, but his family didn’t want to let the restaurant go. He reopened Sushi Jimmi June 15th, but it closed for a second time at the end of July.

“I just shut my restaurant down,” Sinh says. “I didn’t want to be bothered for a while. I spent six months in someone else’s kitchen, just trying to get my mind straight for a little while. I wanted a little more time with my family. Gary approached me about two weeks ago and we talked about it.”

Sinh will bring back sushi favorites from Sushi Jimmi, but he says he also will be in charge of the entire Saltwater Crab menu. “I’ll be tweaking the menu. Redoing everything. Making it better.”

A Sushi Jimmi steak? “Mine is not just a salt-and-pepper steak. Mine is more well seasoned. A lot thicker. A thick cut of meat. I want the quality to be better.” Sinh added, “I want a very strong team. In about three weeks we want to come out strong and we want to give Memphis something to remember.”

That will include “great atmosphere, live music,” he says. “We’re thinking about doing live music — more specials, more drinks. We’re going to give Memphis everything they want. It’s going to be a very stressful three weeks. I’m going to be sleepless. But it’s good for you. I’m a chef. We’re going to start 2020 off with Sushi Jimmi back in town.”

Saltwater Crab is located at 2059 Madison.

Saltwater Crab, a seafood restaurant, is going in the old Indian Pass space near Overton Square. It is set to open June 24th.

While the restaurant will be owned by an out-of-town restaurateur, Gary Lin, there will be a lot of familiar names involved, including Cliff Ward (Second Line), Sam Miller (Erling Jensen, Madison Hotel), and Andy Knight (Loflin Yard, Carolina Watershed, and Railgarten).

Knight says, “Nothing’s been successful in that spot, and I would love for this spot to work.”

According to Knight, the place was gutted, and a second kitchen was added upstairs.

Lin says he was very attracted to the site. “I’ve been to a lot of different spaces all over the country. When I first saw this space, I fell in love with it.”

The plan, says Lin, is to really take advantage of the patio space. He’s removed the large metal archway that read “Indian Pass” (and was at one time “Midtown is Memphis” during the Chiwawa days) and will replace it with one that reads “Midtown Memphis.”

“It’s not the old sign,” he says. “I had to make a new one. It was important for locals.”

Lin, who owns restaurants in Atlanta (including the Asian barbecue spot Smoke + Duck), says that now that he’s in the Memphis market, he’s waiting to see how he’s received before he considers opening more restaurants in the city. “I want to see how Memphis treats me first, if they approve of my management style.”

The menu is expansive, though still being edited at press time. As of now, there are oysters (some Gulf, mostly from the East Coast). There are crab cakes. There will be sushi.

“This real estate needs to have a purpose,” Knight says. “If we can stretch out the square all the way down to Huey’s, we’ll have this whole stretch. Maybe get people to walk a few steps. It will be awesome.”