Six months ago, the city of Alachua didn’t have a single sushi restaurant. Three entrepreneurs noticed, and the race to open the city’s first kicked off.

Now, with Makitori Sushi & Yakitori open on Main Street, Nori Nite poised to open directly across the street and Kumo Hibachi & Sushi coming in the former Mi Apá storefront, the race is over. And so is Alachua’s sushi drought.

Who are Alachua’s new local Asian fare owners and what, besides sushi, are they serving? Where can you find their kitchens and when can you eat there? We’re glad you asked.

Makitori Sushi & Yakitori

Address: 14933 Main St., Alachua
Hours: 11 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday, 5 to 8:30 p.m. Monday through Saturday

Located adjacent to The Good Life Station, Makitori scored first place in the local Alachua Asian fare race.

Since officially opening in January after a soft launch in October, Makitori founder Nick Carter said the restaurant has quickly grown into a casual local lunchtime spot with a more high-end “date night” feel for dinner.

“It has that kind of hometown feel, but that higher-end casual dining to where, yes, you feel comfortable going, but it’s kind of an elevated sense that you’re not going to McDonald’s,” Carter said.

The idea for Makitori came as the owners considered opening a brewery to support its parent company, Florida Fermenters, near Main Street.

Because the city’s previous alcohol ordinance prohibited businesses within its Community Redevelopment Area (CRA)—which includes Main Street—from selling alcohol near religious institutions unless it derived more than half its gross revenue from food, a restaurant with food like Makitori allowed them to do just that.

The Alachua City Commission voted in November to exempt CRA businesses from that ordinance.

“The sushi restaurant concept was originally the restaurant within a new construction built for a brewery with another mixed fermentation business there,” said Makitori Manager Dan Short. “And there were a number of reasons that kind of got pulled into multiple pieces. But we had the restaurant portion kind of sitting on a shelf, and the area was previously very underserved for Asian food, and so we said, well, let’s get it started and give it a shot.”

Carter and Short, who used to work at Alachua’s Daft Cow Brewery, still have a goal of opening a brewery close to downtown. But for now, they’re focused on Makitori, which they said has grown legs of its own thanks to head chef Albert DeSue.

And DeSue is no sushi stranger. With nearly two decades in the restaurant industry across various cultural cuisines, the Gainesville native started his career at Dragonfly Sushi, which Yelp has consistently ranked among its top eateries in the area.

But DeSue said he used to not eat at sushi restaurant places that put too many things on top. He considered that while crafting Makitori’s menu.

“It all tastes the same to me because there’s too much stuff on it. Here, we just try to make our sushi make sense,” DeSue said. “We just try to keep it simple and familiar, but something different at the same time.”

Makitori offers a variety of sushi, from California, yellowtail, tuna and salmon hand rolls, to cucumber, eel avocado and shrimp tempura classic rolls. Vegetable rolls include squash and shiso tomato rolls, and mogu mogu and “futomaki” fat rolls are also made fresh.

DeSue said Makitori releases seasonal menus with new items, sources its ingredients from Japanese purveyors and dry-ages its fish for up to two weeks to calm the flavor and cultivate a buttery texture.

As the name suggests, Makitori also specializes in Japanese skewers called yakitori, a concept that Gainesville’s new Kushi & Co. Japanese street food restaurant just started offering as well.

In addition to good food, DeSue said he wants to elevate customers’ experience with a top-notch bar and hospitality. Customers can casually order lunches via counter service through a touchscreen menu while waiters and waitresses attend to them during dinner.

“We’re just trying to find that medium ground where you’re getting that fine dining feeling, but the vibe is very, very, very chill,” DeSue said. “Fine dining service and that fine dining execution from the back is pretty much what we want to do.”

Carter said the Makitori team is already planning ways to revitalize downtown Alachua by using the restaurant to bring the community together and give back to it.

Recently, Makitori donated beer, cider and mead to an Alachua Chamber of Commerce event and set up a grill at the city’s new free Friday concert series. They also want to host taste testing nights for customers to try new menus, start a supper club subscription and transform the dining room into an evening lounge serving specialty drinks on weekends.

“I think donating and partnering with a lot of the community leaders and those types of things is going to be a big part of it,” Carter said. “There’s a lot of collaborations when it comes to different businesses in the area.”

Nori Nite (coming May 2026)

Address: 14960 Main St., Alachua
Hours: 11 a.m. to 3 p.m., 4 to 10 p.m. Tuesday through Sunday

Although Nori Nite came second in the race for Alachua’s first sushi restaurant, it takes first for hibachi and certainly for Lao fare.

Owner Oulay Inthalangsy plans to open the new restaurant next month across from Makitori, beside Conestoga’s.

The 33-year-old Alachua resident moved from Laos to the U.S. during high school and works as a full-time firefighter with Alachua County Fire Rescue. With many years under his belt, also as a sushi chef, Inthalangsy said he started dreaming about opening his own sushi restaurant about a year and a half ago after noticing there weren’t any in Alachua.

Finding the right location proved to be a challenge and kept Inthalangsy from opening sooner. But he secured the Main Street storefront in January and came up with the “Nori Nite” name reflecting the Japanese word for seaweed that encases sushi (nori) and the lively nighttime atmosphere the bar will bring.

With a neon “Nori Nite” sign now glowing outside and renovations nearing completion, Inthalangsy said he’s looking forward to opening day.

“I put so much work into it; I’m just ready for it to be open,” he said. “When customers come in and try my food for the first time, I want to see how they react.”

Inthalangsy crafted every recipe on the menu, from over a dozen different sushi roll flavors and hibachi entrees, to each soup, salad and drink. His ingredients are locally sourced through a vendor in Gainesville.

He’s got all the classic sushi rolls along with new combinations like the silver fin, wasabi moon, dragon nite, Main Street and Nori Nite rolls under the signature collection. Customers can also order various sake, beer, wine and mocktails drinks at the bar.

In addition to the sushi and hibachi entrees, Inthalangsy said his mother will cook up multiple Laotian dishes, such as the Aw Seen “Lao Stew” made with chicken or beef, Asian eggplants, dill, kaffir lime leaves, shallots and mushrooms.

“We’re also going to have some Lao food. I think that’s very uncommon,” he said. “I’m from Laos, and my mom is a very good cook. I said, ‘Hey, would you be able to cook a couple of these for the restaurant? She said ‘yeah, I got some.’”

Nori Nite will entertain a soft opening for its first two weeks before adding more dishes to the menu. Updates can be tracked on the restaurant’s Facebook.

Kumo Hibachi & Sushi (coming soon)

Address: 15634 US-441, Alachua
Hours: TBD

Although Kumo does not have a website or social media set up yet for updates, the new Asian restaurant has a sign securing the former Mi Apá Latin Café building off US-441.