I am a saltaholic. I shake salt all over everything, even before tasting food, because about 99% of the time, it’ll never be salty enough for me.
So my natural instinct when I sidle up to the sushi bar is to pour a long, loving stream of soysauce into the shoyu sara – the small dish designed specifically for that purpose. I want to pick up a piece of sushi (with my fingers, since that’s okay) and plunge the entire little salmon submarine into that deep brown briny sea, to emerge with the fish dripping dark and every grain of rice soaked through with soy sauce. Salty.
And the sushi chef would keel over right before my very eyes.
The point of sushi is how well the chef seasons the rice with vinegar, sugar, and salt. It’s also the natural flavor and texture of raw fish. And finally, it’s the subtle balance of these two fairly delicate flavors. Drowning sushi in soysauce not only throws off the balance, it kills it completely.
The best thing to do is to pour but a tiny puddle of soysauce in the shoyu sara. Dip, don’t dunk, the sushi in it fish side down, so you maintain the integrity of the rice. And if you’re all fancy like that, you can take a piece of ginger, dip it into the soy sauce, and use it as a brush to “paint” soysauce atop the fish.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
9-30-2005 @ 2:34PM
Blue Balloon said...
For some reason, it's true. It cause the rice into ugly sloppy. Not so pretty.
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10-01-2005 @ 9:54PM
Al said...
When it comes to sushi, I will actually mix a large clump of wasabi in my soy sauce and then drown my nigiri into the mixture. I agree that sometimes, you need to appreciate the full flavor and complexity of the Nigiri(single pieces), maki(roll), or temaki(handroll)...but then there's just times that having that potent mixture of wasabi and soy sauce cannot be beaten....To each their own.
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10-11-2005 @ 10:11AM
jedrek said...
I used to mix my wasabi with my soy sauce, but for some time now, I've been leaving a spot of wasabi on my plate and stroking the fish over it after dipping it.
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