RESTAURANT NEWS | OHIO
Sage Pairs Asian Cooking With Live Events in Downtown Columbus
Owner Sudhir Dubey and chef David Kim built a downtown restaurant where the menu and the calendar share the bill, with Asian-inspired dishes alongside music, art, and tastings.
SAGE | MAP | INSTAGRAM
By Jamie Dutton
6:22 a.m. ET, Nov. 4, 2026
AUTHOR BIO: Jamie Dutton's job has her in airports regularly, as does a family spread out across the Midwest. She’s partial to BPTs and Bell’s.
Sage opened recently in Columbus, Ohio, with a simple premise: dinner should come with something to do afterward. Owner Sudhir Dubey and chef David Kim built the downtown restaurant around Asian-inspired cooking and a calendar of live music, art, and tastings, so the night doesn’t end when the plates are cleared.
The menu leans on creative takes on familiar Asian dishes. The crispy rice, topped with yuzu guacamole and spicy tuna, and the loaded nachos are the shared starters Kim points to first, along with the crab rangoons.
For larger plates, the menu runs to udon noodles with uni butter and cream, miso-marinated salmon, and medium-rare Black Opal Australian wagyu.
The smaller plates get the same attention. The crispy rice is lightly fried and topped with yuzu guacamole, tobiko, jalapeño, and a sweet soy reduction, with a choice of spicy tuna or spicy crab. The chicken wings, dry-brined and double-fried, come tossed in gochujang chili sauce.
But food is only half the plan. Sage pairs the cooking with live entertainment and curated events, and Kim put it plainly: the concept rests on “elevated Asian cuisine, elevated cocktails and bar, and curated events to create a space that can give our guests something to do beyond just eat.” The calendar has included live music and DJs, artist showcases, omakase dinners, and tastings.
Dubey and Kim opened Rishi Sushi together in 2014. Rishi closed in January, and Sage is what the pair built next, under the tagline Taste, Experience, Create. The restaurant tells the story simply: after closing Rishi, Dubey was looking for a place to bring people together, and a conversation with Kim, who had a similar idea, sealed the deal.
Sage also books the space for private celebrations and group events, which fits the rest of the plan. The point is not a single special night, but a place that keeps changing what it offers, so a second visit does not feel like a repeat of the first.
The restaurant frames the idea as community built through food and experience, with guests encouraged to slow down and discover something unexpected. That is the mission statement on its own site, and the programming is how it shows up in practice.
The menu gives the place its anchor, and the calendar gives it a reason to return. At Sage, dinner is the start of the night, not the whole of it.
