Columbus’ Northwest Side—particularly Bethel Road—long has been a hotbed of great international eats, but in recent years the city has welcomed standouts like Fiery Sky Asian Kitchen. The Chinese eatery has distinguished itself with a dynamic menu that plays with both authentic Sichuan dishes and Americanized Chinese classics.
Owner Lu Sha is not new to the business, or even to Columbus Monthly Best New Restaurants accolades: His first Columbus eatery, Xi Xia Western Chinese Cuisine, was a 2020 honoree. Sha sold his part in Xi Xia in late 2021, venturing on to open ramen and Korean fried chicken restaurants in Delaware before returning to Columbus. “After the years, I felt I wanted to do authentic Chinese food again,” he says. “I had a passion for that food, I really enjoyed that and the tastes I grew up with.”
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Sha, who hails from Yinchuan in China’s Ningxia province, has learned to walk the line between honoring the dishes from his childhood while appealing to customers who are new to Sichuan cooking. To that end, he’s created a menu featuring both “local favorites,” meaning well-executed Americanized Chinese dishes, and an “Authentic Chinese Cuisine” menu. “I thought, maybe it’s better for us to separate the menu and make the authentic menu even more authentic,” he says. “We still have a lot of Americanized Chinese dishes on our local favorites. Most customers, for a table of four, will probably order three dishes from the local favorites and two from the authentic.”
Sha’s goal is to get more customers to venture into authentic Sichuan fare, and he’s certainly making an enticing pitch. His di guo bone-in chicken ($24.95) features tender chunks of meat simmered in a dish with little steamed flatbreads ringing the edges. And with dishes like the beef with Hunan chile sauce ($19.95), Sha’s eatery really earns the name Fiery Sky. It features slices of beef cooked with celery, leeks and cilantro and packs a serious punch. “This is a real Hunan chile,” Sha says. “It’s not like American Hunan beef.”
For starters, Sha recommends his dry pot dishes, especially the fried fish filets ($21.95), as well as the crab rangoon ($8.95) and Sichuan spicy wontons ($8.95). He says his mapo tofu ($15.95) is very true to form, and his signature beef stirred noodles ($15.95), the most popular dish at Xi Xia, has carried over to Fiery Sky’s menu. A full bar—with an imaginative cocktail menu—rounds out the offerings.
About Fiery Sky Asian Kitchen
1450 Bethel Road, Northwest Side
614-670-5775
fieryskyasiankitchen.com
Open daily for lunch and dinner
Price range: $13.95 to $34.95
Recommended: Dry pot fried fish fillets, Sichuan spicy wontons, beef stirred noodles
This story appeared in the February 2026 issue of Columbus Monthly as part of the Best New Restaurants of 2026 feature package. See the complete list of our top restaurants here. Subscribe to Columbus Monthly here.
This article originally appeared on Columbus Monthly: 2026 Best New Restaurant Fiery Sky Asian Kitchen Has Two Chinese Menus
Reporting by Nicholas Dekker, Columbus Monthly / Columbus Monthly
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
