Updated August 2026. Dinner for two on opening night, 9717 North Milwaukee Avenue in Glenview. The bill is at the bottom.
For about twenty years there was a sushi restaurant in this strip mall that we treated like a utility. Shiroi Sushi sat between a Dunkin and a dental office on Milwaukee Avenue, and for a stretch during covid we ordered from it once a week, like clockwork. I drove up to that door more times than I can count. Then it closed, and the windows went dark, and every time we passed it Vika and I said some version of the same thing to each other, which is that it was a shame.
So when we heard sushi was coming back into that space, we were going to go regardless. What we did not expect was to walk out of a strip mall on Milwaukee Avenue saying it was one of the best sushi meals we have had anywhere.
We went on a Friday for date night, just the two of us, and it turned out to be their grand opening. That matters for two reasons. It is the reason we are publishing this now rather than sitting on it, and it is the reason you should read the service notes below with a little grace, because what we are describing is a restaurant on day one. We have written up a fair amount of sushi around here, e Sushi in Mount Prospect, Deba and Tekka and Ari, Shakou in Arlington Heights, and this is the first Glenview place we have covered at all. I would say it is also the best fish of the lot.
We used to order from this space every single week
I want to get the sentimental part out of the way first, because it is genuinely why we walked in the door.
Shiroi Sushi was our takeout place. Not a special occasion restaurant, not somewhere we dressed up for, just the number we called. During covid there was a period where we were getting it once a week without discussing it. Vika and I both remember being disappointed when it closed. That predates the website entirely, so there is no review of it here, no photos, nothing. It only exists as a memory, which is part of why walking into the same address and finding it unrecognizable was strange.
The wall between two units is gone now, so the room is roughly double what it was. Vika’s read on the whole thing, standing in the doorway: this is better. I agreed with her then and I still do, which is not a sentence I expected to write about a place we loved for two decades.
The room does not look like a strip mall sushi place
The ceiling is open and painted dark, with exposed duct and track lighting, and the pendants over the tables are woven and warm. There is a long sushi counter with the case running the length of it and stools pulled up. The floor is a herringbone tile. There are large planted trees, a backlit wood panel on one wall, and a lit circular Black Pearl sign near the back. Behind glass there is a private room with its own lighting and a wood floor, and it was full before the main dining room was.
What struck Vika, and I think she is right, is that everything looks chosen rather than ordered. Her words were that it was clearly not thrown together to be done fast and look visually appealing if you do not look too close. The tables, the cups, the flooring, the lighting. It reads as deliberate.
Here is my usual test for this, and Black Pearl passed it. I went to the bathroom, and normally a renovated room is where a restaurant decides to stop spending money. This one has textured plaster walls, brass sconces, an irregular oval mirror and a stone counter. I actually took a picture of it and messaged it to Vika from inside, which tells you how far off my expectations were.
We got there at six and had the place almost to ourselves
We walked in around six on a Friday and there was one other table. Directly behind us a family came in with two small kids, and after that it did not really stop. By the time we left, the back private room was full and the main room was maybe two thirds. So if you want the quiet version of this restaurant, early is the answer, at least for now.
The spicy scallop roll is the one we could not stop talking about
We ordered this first and it set the tone for everything after it.
It comes as six pieces, and it is a regular maki roll rather than one of the specialties, so it is smaller than the rest of what we ordered. Raw scallop, spicy mayo worked through it and drizzled over the top. It is a little sweet. It is not aggressively spicy at all, which surprised me for something with that name.
It was also the only roll we finished, and finishing it is what made both of us say the same thing at the same time, which is that we wished there was more of it. Vika said she could probably have eaten the whole thing herself. If you go once and order one thing, order this.
There is a reason it landed as hard as it did, and it is not flattering to somebody else. Not long ago we ordered a spicy scallop roll at Shakou in Arlington Heights, asked the server directly whether the scallop was raw, and were told yes. Vika is certain what arrived was cooked octopus. They remade it and the remake was identical. At Black Pearl we asked the same question, whether it was fresh or cooked, and the look we got back was closer to confusion at the question. Vika did note they have a cooked octopus item on the menu, so the ingredient exists in the kitchen. It just is not what showed up in the scallop roll.
The Fire Dragon has a chili heat that arrives a second late
This might have been Vika’s favorite. She could not commit, because as she put it, they were all just so good she could not pick one.
The menu has it as chili and spicy tuna inside, topped with eel and avocado, and that matches what came out. Worth flagging, because it is the one cooked element of the night. Everything else we ordered was raw fish, and nothing anywhere on the table was fried or crunchy.
The heat is the thing. It is a chili heat, and it does not hit on contact, it arrives about a second after. I love that, and if you have had the volcano roll at Sushi Para you know the sensation I mean. Combined with the sweetness of the eel sauce it lands as a genuinely good balance rather than a sugar bomb.
It also carries more sauce than anything else we ordered, and this is the part I want to be fair about. It is more than a light drizzle. It is still not swimming in it. A lot of the time we eat somewhere where everything arrives in sauce, it tastes good in the moment, and you leave uncomfortably full without having eaten much fish. That did not happen here.
Aisiteru means I love you, and it is the smartest thing on the menu
The other two rolls we ordered are built the same way with different fish, and once you notice the pattern you cannot unsee it.
The Hamachi Aisiteru is spicy yellowtail inside, topped with fresh yellowtail and avocado. The Sake Aisiteru is spicy salmon inside, topped with fresh salmon and avocado. There is a third one on the menu we did not order, the Maguro Aisiteru, which does the same with tuna. Aisiteru is how they spell aishiteru, which in Japanese means I love you.
The hamachi version was one of three things they suggested when we reached out ahead of the visit, and it was the right suggestion. The cuts on top are generous without being the kind of overhang that falls off when you pick the piece up. The salmon version was rich and buttery, and Vika’s line on it was that it was not too much and not overpowering, just excellent.
If you are the kind of person who orders a spicy roll and then also wants clean fish, this format solves that in one piece, and I do not know why more places do not do it.
The fish is the freshest we have had at a sushi restaurant
I want to be careful with this claim, because it is a big one and it is subjective by nature.
What I can tell you is that between us we could not come up with a place that beat it. The only thing either of us reached for as a comparison was Sushi Roku in Las Vegas, which is a different price bracket entirely, in a mall on the Strip, and which we still think about. That is the company this is keeping in our heads.
Every fish tasted like itself. That sounds obvious. It is not. Vika’s observation was that every roll tasted different, which at a lot of places is not true, because the sauce is doing the talking on all of them.
The avocado deserves a mention on its own. It was a proper green, almost buttery, soft without being past it. It still had texture. There was none of that moment where you bite in and think this could have gone another day.
The rice and the seaweed are the tell
Two things I always check, and they are usually where a place gives itself away.
The rice was clearly cooked recently and seasoned properly. It had flavor on its own. And the nori was crisp, which is the one that impressed me most, because three of the four rolls had rice on the outside. Normally that is exactly when the seaweed goes soft, since it is sitting inside against the rice. It did not here.
The spicy mayo is the one thing we would change, and it is a taste thing
This is the only real criticism either of us had all night, and the interesting part is that we arrived at it from two completely different directions.
Mine is texture. Their spicy mayo is thin. It reads as a dressing rather than a sauce. There was a place in the city years ago, over on Belmont, that we knew as Paul’s House of Sushi and Noodles, and we loved it. This tastes the way theirs did. The closest thing I can put it next to is a Thousand Island with some sriracha stirred through. What I want is thicker, with something in it, flakes or masago, so it has some body. This has none of that.
Vika’s is heat. She wanted more of a kick out of it, and by extension more out of the rolls it went into. Her read was that the spicy rolls never really landed as spicy.
Here is the part you have to weigh that against, and I would rather say it out loud than have you take our word for it. We have a very high spice tolerance. Something that registers as barely spicy to the two of us can be plenty spicy for somebody else. So if you are heat sensitive, do not read Vika’s note as a warning. Read it as two people who like a lot of chili wanting more of it, which is a different thing entirely.
The one that satisfied both of us on that front was the Fire Dragon, which comes with sriracha over the top. That is where the heat actually lived, and neither of us wanted more from it.
Two more things keep the mayo from being a complaint. In the roll it is excellent. The spicy scallop had it both mixed through and drizzled on top and that roll was the best thing we ate. And we always taste it on its own, which is not how a normal person eats, so weigh the criticism accordingly. Vika, who is quicker than I am to push a spicy mayo away entirely, said it was not disappointing. It just was not her favorite.
We did order a side of it. It is a dollar.
The music is a quarter turn too loud, and that is the whole complaint
I hesitate to even put this in, because it is not a complaint so much as a preference, and I want to be clear that we could hold a conversation the entire time without raising our voices.
The music is a lounge sort of techno, and the room is built to match it, so the choice makes sense. It was just a little early in the evening for it, and the crowd coming in around us skewed older. If somebody had come by and asked whether we wanted it turned down, I would have said yes, absolutely. We are talking about an eighth of a turn on the dial.
Three chefs, new staff, and it never showed
There were three sushi chefs working the counter and they looked like they knew exactly what they were doing.
They were also clearly training people, and this is where I was most impressed, because you usually cannot miss it. You know the version where your server mentions they are training somebody and then every single interaction reminds you of it. That did not happen. Service was attentive without hovering, checked in often enough that ordering more was easy, and held up as the room filled. On day one.
Is Black Pearl in Glenview all you can eat?
No. Black Pearl is à la carte only. There is no all you can eat option on the menu or anywhere on their site.
That is worth saying plainly, because the previous restaurant in this space did run an all you can eat special on Sundays, and a lot of the search traffic for sushi in this area is people looking for all you can eat. If that is what you want, we wrote up e Sushi in Mount Prospect, which is all you can eat and is a genuinely good version of it. This is a different kind of meal.
What happened to Shiroi Sushi in Glenview?
Shiroi Sushi, which was at this same address, has closed. Black Pearl now occupies the space and has taken the neighboring unit as well, so the dining room is roughly twice the size it used to be.
I cannot tell you exactly when Shiroi closed. There was no notice and no local coverage that we could find, and several listing sites still show it as open at this address, which is how we know they are not being updated. Our own recollection is that it was about a year ago.
Is Black Pearl good for kids?
We think so, and the honest answer is that we wish we had found out for ourselves, because we went on date night and left regretting it.
When we reached out before the visit they gave us three suggestions, the dishes they told us they are proud of. We took one of them. What happened to the other two says something useful about the place, and about us.
The first was the Hamachi Aisiteru, which we ordered and which was the right call. The second was the Kani Mango, crab and spicy mayo with mango, topped with more mango and wasabi tobiko. We skipped that one, and that is on us and not on them, because we do not like fruit in our sushi. If you do, it is on the menu at seventeen dollars and it is a dish the restaurant put forward itself, so I would take that seriously.
The third was a sukiyaki, and that is the one I actually regret. We almost never order entrees when we go out for sushi. The exception is when the kids are with us, and Emily is the one who would have wanted it. I am fairly confident she would have liked that dish, and we did not order it for the simple reason that it was the two of us and neither of us was going to eat it. They named it among the dishes they are proud of, which is the part that stings. Worth saying: I do not see a sukiyaki on their online menu, so it may be off the printed list or something new. Ask when you go.
Josh would have added a spicy salmon, a rainbow, a California, something simple, which would have meant more rolls on the table and more for all four of us to try.
The room supports it. A family with two small children came in right behind us and looked completely comfortable. One thing to know if you are bringing a bigger group: their menu says a twenty percent gratuity is added to parties of five or more.
We are going back with the kids.
The sake list is more serious than the room suggests
This surprised me enough that it deserves its own note.
We had a large hot sake, which was eleven dollars and was exactly what we wanted with the food. But there is a separate card on the table with a premium list on it, and the range on it runs from a nineteen dollar Suigei up to a Hakkaisan Kongoshin Blue at three hundred and ninety nine dollars, with a couple of Kubotas at one hundred fifty nine and one hundred ninety nine in between. That is not a strip mall sake program.
They are also running a sake tasting as a promotion, five to seven in the evening on the twenty eighth, and there was a handwritten card on our table advertising it. As far as I can tell it is not posted anywhere online, which means the only way you would know about it is by sitting down here or by calling. If you have ever wanted to try something off a list like that without committing to a bottle, that is the night to go.
What we would order, and what we would add
- The spicy scallop roll. Order two. We are not joking about the size.
- The Hamachi Aisiteru. The staff recommendation and the best of the two Aisiteru rolls for us.
- The Fire Dragon, if you want heat. The chili arrives late and it is worth waiting for.
- The Sake Aisiteru if you are a salmon person, which in our house is most of us.
- Next time: the sukiyaki, the Maguro Aisiteru, and something off the nigiri list, because we never got there. Not the Kani Mango, but only because of the mango.
What dinner for two actually cost
Here is the receipt, exactly as it came.
Four rolls, a large hot sake and a side of spicy mayo, seventy seven dollars for two people. For the quality of the fish, I think that is a fair number, and it is worth knowing that we ordered a fourth roll partway through the meal, which we almost never do. We normally decide what we want up front and stop. Here we went back for another because we did not want it to end, and I could have easily gone one more.
| Item | Price |
|---|---|
| Hot Sake (L) | $11.00 |
| Spicy Scallop Roll | $11.00 |
| Fire Dragon Roll | $17.00 |
| Hamachi Aisiteru Roll | $15.00 |
| Sake Aisiteru Roll | $15.00 |
| Spicy Mayo (side) | $1.00 |
| Subtotal | $70.00 |
| Sales tax | $7.00 |
| Total | $77.00 |
One thing to disclose: the kitchen sent out a plate of edamame on the house. We did not ask for it and it is not on the receipt above. Everything else we paid for.
Is Black Pearl worth it?
Yes, and I do not think it is close.
The freshness alone would carry it. The fact that the rice, the nori, the avocado and the balance of sauce are all right too is what moves it from a good meal into the top three sushi restaurants we have been to. Our one criticism is a spicy mayo we would each change in a different direction, which is preference, not a flaw.
The obvious caveat is that we ate there on day one, and day one is when a restaurant is trying hardest. So the real question is not whether it was good, it is whether they hold it. If they do, this place is going to be busy every night and the six o’clock table we walked into will stop existing.
We are going back with Josh and Emily. That is the whole verdict.
Black Pearl, Glenview: location and hours
Address: 9717 North Milwaukee Avenue, Glenview, IL 60025, in the plaza with the Dunkin, near Greenwood Avenue.
Phone: (847) 230-9999
Format: À la carte. No all you can eat.
Hours: Monday through Thursday, 4:00 pm to 11:00 pm. Friday, 4:00 pm to midnight. Saturday, noon to midnight. Sunday, noon to 10:00 pm. They are posted on the door, and the photo here is that sign.
More sushi around the northwest suburbs: e Sushi in Mount Prospect, Deba Sushi Bar in Mount Prospect, Tekka Sushi in Elk Grove Village, Ari Sushi in Des Plaines, Shakou in Arlington Heights, and Sushi Plus Thai by Sensei in Palatine. Further afield, Sushi Roku in Las Vegas is the only place we compared this to.
