Sushi

My greatest guilty pleasure is sushi.  Some people screw up their face in disgust when I tell them this, and some people agree, but to be honest I don't think anyone feels the way about raw fish that I do.

I can't really remember the very first time that I ate it, but I DO remember the very first time that I ate really the really good stuff.  I had been invited out to a little dirtly looking hole in the wall by a Japanese Business person that I was doing some deals with.  It was down a little tiny alley and the door wasn't even marked, but when we walked in every seat was full.

Now, I am not sure any of you have ever seen the inside of a Japanese alleyway restaurant, but imagine a closet that is about 25 feet deep and 6 feet across. Paint this closet in some sort of dirty yellow, and have 200 of your closest friends smoke cigarettes in it for about 5 years, 23 hours a day.  Now, take pieces of white paper, scrawl a signature on it and say it was someone famous, and hang them all over the wall.

This is a restaurant.

We had to wait about 10 minutes to sit at the counter, and the first thing I noticed is that when the Sushi Chef greeted us is how clean he was and how spotless behind the counter was.  My Japanese Friend greeted him, got us some beers, and to be honest, I don't even think he ordered anything.  At this time my Japanese wasn't as good as it is now, but I think I would have caught him ordering 10 different plates of sushi.

When the plates came, I finally met Ootoro.

Ootoro is "super fatty tuna".  This is the whitest cut from the belly of a tuna.  It is probably the only thing I have ever eaten where I was literally speechless for a moment afterword.  I simply melts in your mouth with a buttery texture that no food before or since has graced my palate with.

This began the love affair.

Fast forward at least 10 years to California.  There is sushi everywhere, and nowhere.

The first place I went was staffed by mexican workers, and the raw fish showed up cooked.  I ordered the good old "stand-bys" like yellow tail and tuna, and I ended up with items that I didn't recognize on oddly seasoned rice.  I lasted 1.5 plates before my stomach told my brain I was going to be in trouble if I went any further.

The second place was an even funnier experience.  I went with a new friend who had wanted to try it for some time.  We walked in and I was greeted with the familiar "irashaimase" which is like "welcome, please enjoy".

This is more like it!  In California for a week, missing Japan, I was ready to bust out some Japanese. 

"Osusume ha nan desuka"?  What is your recommendation, I asked.

"I am sorry", he replied, "I am Korean".

Oh.  Wait.  Wasn't that Japanese I heard? 

Two minutes later, a couple is departing, and I hear "owaiso desu",  Japanese for, at least in a sushi place, "Check please".

On and on this repeats.  I guess image is everything.  When a Korean guy moves to America to open a Japanese restaurant, and actually yell in  Japanese when he doesn't speak it, well to me this is just odd.

To be fair, the food was edible.  Much better than the first, but nothing to write home about.  The decor was wonderful, quite beautiful.  Ten minutes in though the real fun began.

The lights dimmed, loud brassy music blared from the speakers, and the entire cast (I don't dare call them waiters or waitresses with all the acting they are doing) come out screaming a Korean birthday song in English.

Owaiso!

The  next place I found was home.  Two guys in a dingy little place in a strip mall.  Both from Japan, they greeted me in unaccented english.  I placed my order with a little bit of apprehension given my previous attempts a connecting with something I loved so much but felt was lost forever.

Bliss.  When the first bite of tai (red snapper) hit my tounge, I knew that everthing would be ok.  I finally spoke to them in Japanese, and with saucer eyes they welcomed me.

Home.