Tonight It Was Sushi

But would you believe I didn’t have any crunchy flake? Well, that’s not entirely true, since we had soft shell crab tempura as a starter. So there. All in all, it was your basic sushi and sashimi meal, although two things stood out – one good, one problematic. The first was that the uni was the best I have ever had. Perfect, really. Absolutely clean flavour, not iodine-y, faint brininess, and the texture was just melting custard that melded with the rice, and oh.

The other concerns fish identification. Generally speaking, I think it’s a good thing when sushi chefs can properly identify the fish they are serving. You know, kind of like an Italian chef knowing the difference between spaghetti and linguine, and a French chef knowing the difference between béchamel and hollandaise. Among other sashimi, Jim ordered hirame, or fluke, and I ordered tai, or red snapper. Our plates arrived . . . and it was clear to us first by looking, then by tasting, that I had the fluke and Jim had the red snapper. We called the waitress over. She didn’t know, and she took my plate, with a piece of each side by side, over to the sushi chef. They conferred, and she returned. She pointed to the fluke, “This one is red snapper,” and pointing to the red snapper, “this one is fluke.”

We go fishing. We catch fluke on a regular basis. On a regular basis, we make sashimi out of the fluke we have caught. We know what it looks like, and what it tastes like. The sushi chef mis-identified them. Like I said, problematic.