Sushi is Humbling

Tobiko, Kampachi, Albacore, Salmon Roe, Wasabi

So I am a pretty damn good cook and in general the food that I make turns out really, really good and overall quite impressive.  This is great right?  With minimal effort and almost any set of ingredients I can throw together a delicious pro quality meal.  Every once in a while however I decide that I want make Sushi at home.  I absolutely love sushi.  There is nothing I would rather eat and/or cook that great seafood and sushi is the gold standard.  It is also expensive as hell and it’s hard for me to get enough.  So maybe once or twice a year for the past 15 I decide to give it a whirl at home.  And every single time I come away profoundly humbled by the experience.

Meticulous prep and a razor sharp knife

This time the impetus was a date with a bona fide professional cook who also totally loves sushi.  Unlike me she had not made it before and we were both generally excited to fill our bellies with as much raw fish as possible.  I spent the afternoon shopping and prepping before she finished work and made it to my place for dinner.  By then I had started the rice (which all sushi aficionados know is the most important part), and prepped out fresh grated Wasabi (the most expensive item of the night BTW), a cucumber salad, and various veggies for rolls.

Remaining of course was the actual cutting of the fish.  Anyone who has had sushi before gets the basic idea.  Rice, fish, veggies, wasabi, seaweed and soy in various combinations.  I won’t bother giving explanations for how to make it as I am not a true expert and the info is available elsewhere.  Here are a few key things I learned or was reminded of though.

•  It’s hard to have a conversation while making sushi. It really requires one’s full attention to not make an ass of one’s self in the process.
•  Practice a few times with just the specific rice because each brand and even harvest is a bit different.  I used a new to me brand and the rice came out just a touch sticky for my taste.  Perfection is a hard note to hit and to make great sushi everything must be just right.  It all starts with the rice.
• Even a very skilled chef can be humbled by cutting fish for sushi.  
•  It’s hard to calibrate the right amount to make.  I suggest not doing more than 2/3 C of rice per person and doing a fair bit of sashimi.  It’s easy to make too many rolls or nigiri.  I ended up with a plate of leftovers I gave to my neighbor.  Not too efficient.
•  Hard cider and sushi is a nice combo (I liked pear the best).
•  I didn’t realize how sloppy my knife skills were until I did this.  Try cutting a perfect rectangle out of a piece of seaweed with a chef’s knife.  It is not easy and you really notice the errors.

Now I probably won’t make sushi again too soon so it’s unlikely I will be mastering this anytime soon.  What it really reminded me though was that it is easy to become complacent.  I plan to take this mindset into my  next meal and really focus on fundamentals and continued excellence in flavor and technique.  Its easy to take the easy road to save some effort and stop growing as a person.  This is true in the kitchen and true in life. 

So with all of that the end product was delicious even though it was not meticulously perfect.  We had fun so my mission was accomplished.  Sushi is a great date and something every serious cook should try sometime J