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THE SUSHI EXPERIENCE by Hiroko Shimbo (Alfred Knopf)

Everything You Need To Know About Sushi – Understanding It, Making It, Enjoying It

Hiroko Shimbo is a well-known and widely admired authority on Japanese food. The Sushi Experience is a comprehensive, engaging and instruc6tive book, I think the best ever written, on the fascinating world of sushi….the delights of eating it, preparing it, and savoring it in its many forms.

The books is divided into the history of sushi (showing how it has evolved into the phenomenon it is today); a typical sushi bar; the aspects of the experience, from the ordering and the etiquette of eating it to the appropriate exchange with your sushi chef).

There are step-by-step illustrated instructions on how to make sushi rice properly, and how to shape the rice around a variety of delicious fillings. There are sauces and accompaniments to complement the sushi meal. It’s all here in this all-encompassing, gloriously illustrated book, along with stories about fishermen, knife makers, tea growers, wasabi farmers, and sake brewers. Enjoy!

CURED SALMON, GRAVLAX, DECORATED SUSHI
SAKE NO MARINE CHIRASHI

Home-made gravlax (salt and sugar cured salmon) makes an ideal chirashi-zushi topping. It is important to purchase absolutely fresh salmon, which is also free of parasites. Go to a trusted fishmonger and ask for the right variety, among the many types of salmon that may be for sale. If your fishmonger does not understand precisely what you are asking for, best go to another shop.

Start marinating the salmon a day in advance. Prepared gravlax keeps in the refrigerator for a couple of days.

Makes 4 small or 4 large sushi bowl servings

For the gravlax:

• 1 pound absolutely fresh Norwegian or Scottish Atlantic farmed salmon fillet for gravlax preparation, skin attached
  
• 1 tablespoon sea salt
• 2 tablespoons sugar

• 1/ 4 cup and 2 tablespoons white wine vinegar
• 2 tablespoon olive oil
• 1/ 4 cup white wine or sake (rice wine)
• 2 ounces radicchio, cut into julienne strips or other salad greens (about 1 cup)
• 2 ounces chive sprouts or other seed sprouts (about 1 ½ cup)
• 8 cherry tomatoes cut into thin slices
• Ponzu sauce
• 6 cups (lightly packed) prepared sushi rice for small bowls or 8 cups (lightly packed) prepared sushi rice for large bowls
• 1/3 cup sweet pickled ginger, chopped fine

Cut the salmon in half across. Spread a sheet of plastic wrap on your working counter. Mix the salt and sugar together and sprinkle one-quarter of it on the plastic wrap. Arrange the salmon, skin side down, over the salt and sugar mixture.

Sprinkle two 1/ 4 portions of the salt and sugar mixture over the salmon flesh and place the remaining piece of the salmon fillet, skin side up, on top. Sprinkle the remaining salt and sugar mixture on the skin of the upper fillet.

Wrap the salmon tightly in plastic wrap. Place it in a shallow stainless steel pan, skin-side down, and set another stainless steel pan on top as a weight. Secure the two pans together with strong rubber bands in three or four places, which will give added pressure. Refrigerate about 14 hours.

Remove the salmon from the plastic wrap and rinse it quickly in a large bowl of salty water, then drain and wipe dry with paper towel.

Mix the 2 tablespoons of the white wine vinegar with 1/ 4 cup water in a small bowl. Rinse the salmon with the vinegar water, then wipe it dry with paper towel.

With a pastry brush paint a thin coat of olive oil on the bottom of a large platter. Remove the skins from the salmon and cut the fillets, at an angle starting at the narrow end into 32 thin slices – 16 from each fillet. As you cut the slices, place them on the oiled platter without overlapping. After you have arranged all of them paint the slices with additional olive oil. Mix the remaining white wine vinegar and white wine in a small cup, and pour it over the salmon slices. Let stand for 15 minutes in the refrigerator, then remove from the platter and drain.

Mix the radicchio, chive sprouts, and sliced tomato in a bowl with a little olive oil and then with a generous amount of ponzu sauce. Have at hand the sushi rice and four shallow soup bowls, about 1 1/ 2 or 2 1/ 2 cups size.

Toss the sushi rice with the sweet pickled ginger in the sushi tub or wooden bowl.

Spoon 1/ 4 of the sushi rice - 2 cups (large bowl) or 1 1/ 4 cups (small bowl) – into each bowl, making gently sloping mounds with a flat top in the center. Arrange the slices of salmon, like the spokes of a wheel, on top. Garnish the very center of the sushi rice with the radicchio mixture.

Additional instructions;

You can prepare the sushi rice, the salmon and other materials in advance. Do the final assembly just before the serving.

At the time of serving the rice should be warm and the fish should be chilled. Serve without dipping sauce.

YUZU FLAVORED PONZU SAUCE, PONZU

Ponzu is made with the juice of a kind of citron, yuzu – a tangerine-size citrus fruit with a thick, bumpy rind. Bright green in summer, yuzu turns golden yellow in autumn when it is ripe. Like lemon, yuzu is valued for its rind and juice, which are bursting with fragrance and a slightly tart and bitter flavor. The yuzu is not generous, producing only a little less than a tablespoon or so of juice per fruit. To get 1/ 2 cup of yuzu juice, as is suggested in this recipe, is expensive and difficult, especially outside Japan.

So, purchase three yuzu fruits and for the rest substitute with good quality komezu, rice vinegar. Adding even a small quantity of yuzu juice to the vinegar creates the distinctive flavor of ponzu.

If no yuzu fruit is available, you may use the juice of other citrus fruits such as lemon, lime or grapefruit. Japanese and Asian food stores carry freshly squeezed plain yuzu or the juice from other Japanese citrus fruits, such as kabosu or dai-dai, packed in small bottles. This is a good substitute when the fresh fruit is not in season or is un-available. But watch out for the salted variety, since then you will need to adjust the recipe in order to avoid making your sauce too salty.

This aromatic sauce brightens many Japanese dishes. In Chapter V: Great Sushi Accompaniments, you will find dishes which are flavored or served with ponzu sauce. So try to have homemade ponzu available in your refrigerator. It keeps about 2 months but after that loses its flavor.

Makes 2 cups

• 1/4 cup mirin (sweet cooking wine)
• 1 cup shoyu (soy sauce)
• 1/ 2 cup yuzu juice, bottled plain yuzu, kabosu or dai-dai juice; or good quality komezu (rice vinegar)
• 1/ 2 cup freshly squeezed lemon or grapefruit juice
• 2 inches kombu (kelp)
• 1 cup katsuobushi (bonito fish flakes)

Fill a large bowl with cold water and ice cubes. Pour the mirin into a small saucepan and bring to a simmer over medium heat. Add the shoyu and cook over low heat for 5 minutes. Remove the saucepan from the heat and set it in the large bowl of ice water. When it has cooled, add the yuzu juice or rice vinegar, lemon and grapefruit juices, kelp and fish flakes. Pour the sauce into a clean jar and refrigerate, covered with a tight lid, for one week. Strain the ponzu sauce through a fukin (tightly woven cotton-cloth) or strong paper towel lined strainer, discarding the kelp and fish flakes. Refrigerate in a clean bottle, capped.

COOKED SEAFOOD CHIRASHI-ZUSHI/ SHIN-KAISEN CHIRASHI

During sunny, gorgeous, cool autumn days, when I want to feed my family or guests a good seafood sushi with a nice glass of white wine, I prepare a modern cooked seafood chirashi-zushi. To make this dish special, flavorful, and nutritious, I use brown and red rice for the sushi rice.

Makes 4 small or 4 large sushi bowl servings

Vegetable salsa:

• 1/2 red bell pepper (about 1/4 pound), cut into ¼-inch cubes
• 2 ounces Japanese cucumber or 1 small Kirby cucumber, cut into 1/4-inch cubes
• 2/3 avocado, firm but ripe, peeled and cut into ¼-inch cubes
• 1/ 4 pound (about 1/ 2 medium) tomato, seeded and cut into 1/ 4-inch cubes
• 1/3 cup chopped coriander leaves
• 1 green jalapeno, grilled until the skin is charred, peeled and minced
• Sea salt, olive oil, lemon juice, black peppercorns, cayenne pepper

• 1 cup sake (rice wine) or white wine, mixed with 1/ 2 cup water
• 4 (each about 2 1/ 2 ounces) large scallops, each cut crosswise into 4 disks
• 4 (each about 1 ounce) baby squid or 1 large (about 4 ounces), cleaned
• 12 large shrimp (21 to 30 counts per pound) in their shells
• 1/ 2 pound salmon fillet, cut into 12 thin slices
• 1/ 2 pound monk fish fillet, cut into 12 thin slices
• Rice vinegar
• 6 cups (lightly packed) prepared sushi rice for small bowls or 8 cups (lightly packed) prepared sushi rice for large bowls

Make the salsa: Toss the red bell pepper, avocado, cucumber, tomato, jalapeno and coriander in a bowl. Add 1 teaspoon salt, 1 tablespoon olive oil, 1 tablespoon freshly squeezed lemon juice, and freshly ground black pepper and cayenne pepper to taste. Rest the salsa in the refrigerator for one hour to overnight.

Pour the sake and water into a small saucepan and bring to a simmer. Add a little salt and the scallop disks, and cook over medium-low heat for 1 to 2 minutes or until the scallops are briefly cooked through, turning them over several times. Scoop out the scallops with a slotted spoon, reserving the sake broth, and transfer to a paper towel-lined platter. Drop in the squid, cook for 2 minutes, remove and cut it into rings. Cook the shrimp in their shells for 2 minutes in the same pan, then cool, remove the shells, de-vein, and butterfly. Cook the fish in the same way for 1 to 2 minutes. Place all the cooked seafood on a platter, paint with a layer of olive oil and rice vinegar, cover with plastic wrap, and refrigerate.

When you are ready to serve have at hand the sushi rice and four Western shallow soup bowls, about 1 1/ 2 or 2 1/ 2 cup size.

Spoon 1/ 4 of the sushi rice - 2 cups (large bowl) or 1 1/ 4 cups (small bowl) – in each bowl, making gently sloping mounds with a flat top in the center.

Decorate the top of the sushi rice with the vegetable salsa and then arrange the seafood.

Additional instructions;

You can prepare the seafood and other materials in advance, refrigerated. Do the final presentation just before the serving.

This sushi can be eaten more easily with a fork, knife, and spoon. Serve at room temperature.