Shizuoka store serves up a few of the finest bonito we’ve ever had, and allows you to be a part of making it.
Bonito, or katsuo, because it’s referred to as in Japanese, is one in every of Japan’s favourite varieties of sashimi. However whereas most sashimi is totally uncooked, there’s a singular sort of katsuo sashimi referred to as katsuo tataki, during which the sashimi is seared.
Katsuo tataki originated in Kochi Prefecture, nevertheless it’s grown to nationwide reputation. So on a latest Japan Railways press tour in Shizuoka, which simply so occurs to be the number-one prefecture in Japan when it comes to how a lot bonito is caught there, we weren’t about to overlook out on not solely an opportunity to style katsuo tataki, but in addition to see the way it’s made, and to attempt our hand at making it ourselves.
Kawanao (whose entrance banner is pictured above), is a fish processer that’s been in enterprise for six generations within the Shizuoka city of Yaizu. They provide quite a lot of marine merchandise, and in addition a katsuo tataki-making expertise with costs beginning at 2,300 yen (US$15).
▼ Takahiro Yamaguchi, Kawanao’s proprietor
The katsuo tataki session begins with Kawanao’s employees choosing a bonito and cleansing it.
Working with swift, exact actions, Yamaguchi solely took 5 minutes to provide three completely beautiful filets, doing all the course of with out the assistance of any equipment.
The searing course of is equally old-school. The bonito filets are positioned on a grill, and that grill is positioned on a pitchfork, which you maintain in your palms in the course of the searing course of.
In line with these conventional strategies, there aren’t any fuel burners or blowtorches concerned. As a substitute, the bonito is seared within the flames of a straw-burning fireplace!
We’re guessing that approach again within the day, straw was a fairly unusual gasoline to make use of for cooking fires, however we are able to’t recall ever seeing it used for a meal we had been going to eat. Actually, we weren’t certain how robust of a flame would you possibly can even get from straw…
…oh…
…WOW…
Okay, so it seems you may get some very intense warmth from straw. At its largest flares, the hearth was taller then we had been!
After watching the Kawanao employees reveal, it was time for us to present it a go. The pitchfork/grill/fish combo is surprisingly heavy, however the employees is standing by to assist assist members in the event that they begin to have bother dealing with the burden.
As soon as the employees determines that the fillet is seared excellent, it will get taken out of the flames.
We had been overcome with a virtually irresistible want to seize maintain of the fillet and chomp into it, however calmer, classier heads prevailed, and so it was sliced as sashimi…
…elegantly plated…
…and solely then was it time to style it.
It was implausible, bursting with taste and a tantalizing mixture of flavors and textures, with the middle moist and retaining the sweetness of the fish’s fats, and the periphery with a classy char-grilled contact. Although this wasn’t our first time consuming katsuo tataki, it was on an entire different stage than examples of the dish we’ve had elsewhere, with a spot so large that it felt like this was the primary time we’d actually skilled the complete wonders of seared bonito, and if you happen to’d like to participate in a session at Kawanao too, reservations will be made by the JR Central web site right here.
Associated: Kawanao
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