Seafood Plate Quiz
If there’s one kind of blogging I don’t do well it is food blogging, as has been proved time and again. But I’m no quitter and I will give it a go again with this seafood plate that I ordered in a small izakaya (restaurant) in Matsue City, Shimane prefecture, last year. How many ingredients, fish, vegetable, garnishes, etc., can you identify? I think I know half of these myself. For this seafood set course I think I paid about 1480 yen, which is not much, not dirt cheap but very very reasonable. I think I had to order more rice though! I think I picked it because it was Today’s Special. Always a safe bet! Oh, and maybe I should offer a prize to celebrate the fact that this blog post is the 1300th published post on this blog!
Ooh, the top one looks like either white bass or yellowfin tuna sashimi. The garnish is (I think) shiso leaves, with shredded red-colored pickled ginger and daikon (the white stuff that looks like noodles).
The second photo is harder to identify, but I’m guessing it’s some sort of tempura. I see a bit of tail fin but can’t make out that Cthulhu-like black whiskery stuff.
Baby squid stuffed with shrimp?
Thanks for this! You spotted more than I could have done – and I even ate the thing! (^-^;) Not 100% sure on the correct answers though.
I guess I have no luck trying out this game, but congrats for the post, and the shots are amazing again
The second picture’s little white bowl, with the spiral pattern is something I would love to see in my collection!
Thank you Timi! You’d love shopping in Japan! (^-^)
First photo: shredded daikon; shiso leaves; carrot curl; wasabi; half-slice of lemon. Two types of seaweed that I can’t identify specifically. I don’t really know the fishes of Japan, and it’s very difficult to work from a photo, but I would guess that one of the ones in front could be Tai (Red Snapper), and that the stuff hiding between the shiso leaves could be a mackerel of one sort or another (there are several). I’m not 100% certain about the piece of leaf that this is all sitting on, but I would guess some kind of bamboo.
Second photo: that’s either a half-slice of lemon or a half-slice of orange as a garnish, and the tiny pinkish bowl appears to contain finely-chopped negi. The fried object appears to be a fish or part of one, but given only one angle and with some of it out of focus, I can’t really be sure, and I can’t begin to guess what kind. The brown liquid in the swirl bowl could easily be a mixture of shoyu and ponzu, but without sniffing or tasting it I’m not making any bets. I can’t see what’s in the bowl on the left well enough to identify any of it, but I could guess at a half-slice of lemon at the extreme bottom left corner of the photo.
I would love to see other views of all of this; it’s making me hungry!
“…the stuff hiding between the shiso leaves could be a mackerel of one sort or another (there are several). I’m not 100% certain about the piece of leaf that this is all sitting on, but I would guess some kind of bamboo.”
I was thinking mackerel for that, too.
But the stiff, dark green leaf at the base may be a section of a banana leaf. I’m used to seeing it as the decorative base for the guacamole I order at one of the restaurants that E likes to go to.
Hi.
I thought about banana leaf; but if you look at a banana leaf you’ll notice that the veins emerge perpendicular (or nearly so) to the midrib, which is wide and pale. This leaf has a narrow brown midrib, and the veins are nearly parallel to it. Also, given that Tokyobling is in a place where bamboo is ubiquitous and crucially important, it seems like something people would be likely to use.
Jon, your skills are amazing! You should be professional with this! I am not 100% you are correct, but all very excellent guesses. The fish is a blank page for as well, but I am almost certain mackerel and tai is involved somehow (mackerel being just about the only fish that is still plentiful in our oceans…).
Hi!
I should perhaps point out that I am joyously mad about food in general, and I put quite a bit of energy into tasting it and smelling it and thinking about it. [Would this item or ingredient go together nicely with some other item that I've had, perhaps one that comes from a different culture? ...etc.]
I started eating sushi when I was a little kid (long story), and I’ve been attending to it carefully and thoughtfully since about 1975. Since that time, several wonderful sushi chefs over here (at least 4 in the US and 1 in Canada) have taught me lots of things — not just introducing me to specific items, but also helping me understand about seasonal things (like fuki, ikura, or dobin-mushi), about doing things with local ingredients, and about the “story arc” of the meal — how it tends, for example, to go from lighter things with delicate flavors toward heavier things with more pronounced flavors (though of course there can be exceptions, and sometimes it goes in waves — perhaps raw sashimi followed by cooked/crispy sashimi, then continuing with lighter sushi followed by richer sushi).
It definitely helps that I’m not afraid to ask questions. Really good sushi chefs are not just performance artists, they also thrive on interaction. They care about your impressions of the food; they care about what you like and what you dislike; they care about whether you care about what you are eating and how they are preparing it. They notice whether you are savvy about the food; and asking questions is a perfectly fine way to get there. Also, in a good sushi place the chef has forgotten more than I will ever know, and is intimately familiar with what’s fresh and what’s particularly interesting. If I order the things I already know about, I am effectively putting handcuffs on them, which is unkind and not a good use of their time and expertise. Besides, if I do that I probably won’t find out what’s best today, and I won’t encounter any new things, unless the chef goes out of his/her way to make suggestions. The bottom line is that I just don’t order, except if the restaurant is screamingly busy and the chef doesn’t have the time or cycles to deal.
Anyway, many thanks for the kudos. I will say again that your photos (not just the food ones) are wonderful — I’m hungry all over again.
Jon, I wish I had half your knowledge, skill, enthusiasm and energy! You are a role model for me! Unfortunately I wasn’t born with much interest in food, or the wish to acquire that kind of skill in learning about it! Thank you for your interest and for setting an example!
Congrats on your 1300th post! Looking forward to more.
I can only identify the shiso, daikon garnish, wasabi, and seaweed. I don’t care what kind of fish the sashimi and tempura are, my mouth is watering
Haha… sometimes you are very Japanese, sometimes not so Japanese Kaori! Thanks for the kind comment! I have been following your blog, if it’s is too hot even for you down there then I would be practically dead by now. Air con?
whatever it is, it looks delicious!
It really was! (^-^)