Or if you do, keep another dish of soy sauce without wasabi. Some pieces of sushi are better with only soy, or only wasabi.
My first exposure to sushi was at the Rio buffet at Vegas. It became one of my staples whenever I went there (along with the Mongolian BBQ). Now I occasionally order it delivered, although I mostly stick to assorted standard rolls or if I’m feeling adventurous nigiri. I’d like to go to a real sushi place and have a chef suggest things, but with my mobility issues that would be a bit of a problem.
Huh, i stick with nigiri if I’m not feeling adventurous. That feels like the simple, basic stuff.
The Reddit poster really knew what they were talking about with their thread title!
Yeah, it looked weird from early on, but when they got to mushing the sushi into the soy sauce, it looked silly, and when they told you how to politely request the illegal endangered animals on the menu…
I have to say the whole degree of (assumed?) rigid ceremony about sushi outside of Japan is both bewildering & off-putting.
Inside Japan is equally off-putting, but it’s their right to choose to operate that way.
It’s just food. Order it, eat it, savor it. Next! I’m the customer, not a feudal supplicant to some dude w a knife, some fish, & some sauce.
I like eating it. The rest is BS.
I really like sushi. I eat sushi all the time. Often, i eat it directly out of the takeout container. I’ve eaten sushi in airports and train stations, on park benches, and, of course, in my own kitchen. I eat it however the hell i want.
All the rules are like rules about not cutting up your steak into lots of little pieces before you start eating, or rules against putting ketchup on a hotdog, or rules against eating pizza with a fork. Yeah, people might look at you a little funny if you break these rules.
If you aren’t familiar with sushi, it’s worth knowing that the intention is not for you to saturate it with soy sauce. And it’s worth knowing there’s a risk the nigiri will fall apart if you dip the rice into soy sauce. Beyond that, eat it how you like.
I’ve been following and participating in this thread, and I think your impression of “rigid ceremony” is mostly a misunderstanding.
Sushi is a special kind of food that many people know little about, so a bit of instruction on how to best enjoy it is helpful. And a sushi chef is a special kind of chef, in one sense much like any other gourmet chef, but taken to an extreme. It takes years of training and a long apprenticeship to become a great sushi chef.
It’s not just about the physical assembly of nigiri, but about careful selection of the seafood and other ingredients, about knowing exactly what flavours complement what seafood, and about skillfully creating elegant presentations. It’s a fact known to all gourmet chefs that an appealing presentation is part of makes great food enjoyable, and sushi chefs take this to an extreme. My favourite sushi bar extends this aesthetic even further with a sushi bar counter and table tops made from hinoki wood, from the Japanese cypress, known for its natural fragrance and beauty. It’s all part of creating the perfect aesthetic for this noble form of culinary art.
If you ever come to Chicago I know a FANTASTIC steak house I’d like to take you to.
If you ask for ketchup with your steak that’s your right but I will never buy you dinner again.
Just saying.
Indeed. But also, in the traditional omakase, there is a close interaction between the client at the sushi bar and the chef preparing each piece for you, applying all the skill that comes from years of training and experience. If you make an ass of yourself with some boorish move like putting way too much soy sauce on it, like I once did, it’s almost like a personal affront to the chef.
I’ve only been to an actual sushi restaurant once; wasn’t particularly upscale but still cost about $100 for me and my girlfriend.
I enjoyed it. I also liked the miso soup.
For the most part, when I get a hankering for sushi, I go to Crazy Buffet in Chesapeake. It not only has a sushi bar, but a hibachi grill. And I’ll occasionally partake in grocery store sushi.
Best meal I have ever had was omakase in San Francisco on my 50th birthday with my GF.
A few years later we had omakase in Chicago, it was bad, we got into a fight and broke-up (not because of lousy sushi but it started it…as one might guess the problems ran to a lot more than sushi).
It’s hard to know before you go what it will be like. When you find a good one, stick with them.
I see what you are getting at.
Please note there are (non-sushi) places in this country where if you put ketchup on whatever specialty the chef has, you will be at least scorned.
See?
What you’re specifying is called omakase which is basically fixed-price, chef’s choice. As the name suggests, you don’t order, the chef just gives you things. You’re intended to chat with them, compliment the food, ask for more of what you like, try unfamiliar things if offered. It’s social not transactional.
If you let them know you’re a first-timer, then they’ll guide you accordingly. Make sure it’s an actual Japanese place, because other places will make it into some hoity-toity prix fixe thing, especially western-owned joints. Be sociable, be curious, be appreciative. Invite them to explain things, most of them are proud to talk about what they do, and appreciate the interest. Since you mentioned you’re not drinking alcohol, make sure you tip well.
There’s really no wrong way to do it, but there are ways to get more out of the experience. Some chefs may act a little annoyed if you add a bunch of extra condiments, as if they didn’t do a good enough job, but ultimately it’s your food. Don’t dip nigiri in soy sauce because the rice will fall apart, you won’t be able to pick it up, and you’ll look like a novice. Grab the fish slice with chopsticks, dip it in soy, then put it back on the rice and eat it. But try it as it is first, you may find that you prefer it.
I’ve never tried that. I sometimes grab the whole thing with my chopsticks and flip it to dip the fish side in the soy sauce. And i sometimes gently dip the rice into the soy sauce, like a savage. (But i like rice imbued with soy sauce. And it usually doesn’t fall apart if you are delicate.)
I may try separating it and dipping the fish next time.
When I worked behind the bar, I originally got pissed off when customers would do stupid stuff, like layer the shoga on top of the nigiri or soak it in the shoyu before eating it, but this was a different time (early 1980s) when sushi was still pretty new in the US. There was one guy who was particularly obnoxious: he’d bring in a small bag with a bunch of jars of different sauces. I don’t remember what they were, but one of them looked a lot like sriracha or sambal, and others were various shades of brown (bean sauce? hoisin?). He would then slather these sauces on nearly every kind of sushi he ordered, offering it to other customers sitting around him, telling them how much better his sauces made everything taste. My boss knew how frustrated I was serving this guy, but I calmed down appreciably when he reminded me that the customer was paying, he was a regular, and it wasn’t for me to decide how he should enjoy his meal. Then he casually pointed out that, knowing he was going to adulterate nearly everything I gave him, I shouldn’t bother giving him the best stuff. Not serve him scraps, exactly, but the parts next to the scraps. The more sinewy, irregular parts. The parts that might otherwise go into the staff chirashi meal.
The difference with pouring ketchup on a steak vs. dipping nigiri into a wasabi/shoyu slurry is that by the time the steakhouse chef finds out what you’ve done to the porterhouse he’s grilled perfectly, it’s too late for him to do anything about it. But the itamae can definitely turn down the quality of his work for you if you’ve shown you don’t have the knowledge and palate to appreciate it. Will you enjoy it? Probably. Will it be the best experience possible? Definitely not.
Personally I could never make that work for me, but if you have a technique that works for you, go nuts.
I’ve seen this recommendation before, and I’ve seen it done. The problem with doing this, though, is that the neta (topping) isn’t just placed on top of the rice, it’s actually gently molded or pressed onto the rice so it’s a cohesive unit. A rather delicate unit, but still cohesive. Taking the top off breaks that cohesion, and you just have a slice of fish on a rice ball. A good nigiri is more than just that.
Also to add, a proper nigiri will have the right amount of wasabi embedded right in it. Removing the fish and messing around with it risks losing the wasabi in the dish of soy sauce.
My much preferred option is asking the chef to brush soy sauce on the sushi (when it’s required – some sushi servings come with their own special sauce or seasoning). The most common option is just gently running the fish side through the soy sauce, but not touching the rice.
Yes, that’s why I’ve never done it i like the fish to be attached to the rice. There’s something nice about that. I’m always sad if they come apart before they get into my mouth.
If it’s not the recommended thing, I’ll stick with what I’m doing. I enjoy sushi a lot. I must be doing something right.