Yo!Sushi!

[AleisterCrowley]

Fresh! Japanese! Food!

Please STOP! Doing! That!

[bungeejumper]

Fresh! Good! Idea!

LOL, while checking out some sushi websites today for another LemonFool rant (on food), I came across an entertaining explanation that the concept of "fresh" can legitimately be extended to include "deep-frozen in Japan, then ferried around the globe to be defrosted in London".

Fair enough, I suppose, if you're eating puffer fish which can kill you if you bite into the wrong bit of it, and for which you presumably need the essential skills of an ancient Tokyo chef who's only had eight fatalities since 1953. But otherwise, maybe stretching the semantic envelope just a little bit?

BJ

[redsturgeon]

Fresh! Japanese! Food!

Please STOP! Doing! That!

Have you seen the VW UP! ?

[AleisterCrowley]

NO!

[Lootman]

LOL, while checking out some sushi websites today for another LemonFool rant (on food), I came across an entertaining explanation that the concept of "fresh" can legitimately be extended to include "deep-frozen in Japan, then ferried around the globe to be defrosted in London".

If you're going to fly in tuna from Tsukiji fish market to London, then what method ensures that it is fresher upon arrival? Freezing it and then thawing it? Or just sending it as is?

Surely the notion of "fresh" is in terms of how it looks, smells and tastes, the general concept being that the more it decomposes the less fresh it will be. Freezing arrests decomposition, although can in some cases change the chemical composition. An analogy might be peas that are picked and immediately frozen tasting better than the peas your local greengrocer sells that have been lying around for a few days.

There are some exceptions to that. Game tastes better if it is allowed to break down, and my experience with cooking dover sole is that it gets better before it starts to get worse.

I guess my point is that word "fresh" isn't really defined and is overused so much that I don't think of it as being a useful label. "Natural" is another useless label. In a restaurant "freshly cooked" or "fresh fish" can mean something from last week that has been preserved somehow.

Anyway, my point is that some things taste better frozen than fresh, since fresh can mean nothing more than "never frozen".

[bungeejumper]

If you're going to fly in tuna from Tsukiji fish market to London, then what method ensures that it is fresher upon arrival? Freezing it and then thawing it? Or just sending it as is?

....I guess my point is that word "fresh" isn't really defined and is overused so much that I don't think of it as being a useful label. "Natural" is another useless label. In a restaurant "freshly cooked" or "fresh fish" can mean something from last week that has been preserved somehow.

Anyway, my point is that some things taste better frozen than fresh, since fresh can mean nothing more than "never frozen".

All excellent points (especially about "natural"), and well taken, apart from the idea that last week's frozen fish can legitimately be described as fresh. Not around these parts, it can't, and I'll fight any man who says it can.

AIUI, however, there's also a darker side to this freezing business. Storage at minus 20C for a couple of days is required to absolutely, definitively, murder some of the unmentionable nasties (shudder) that are by no means uncommon in Japanese sushi/sashimi, but which very rarely show up on tables in the west.

It's an ill wind, etc.

BJ

[swill453]

All excellent points (especially about "natural"), and well taken, apart from the idea that last week's frozen fish can legitimately be described as fresh. Not around these parts, it can't, and I'll fight any man who says it can.

I think you'll find that a lot of "fresh" fish in the shops has been previously frozen (at sea).

Scott.

[csearle]

Guys! Don't ruin fish for me. As a pescatarian (apparently) it's all I've left. C.

[bungeejumper]

Guys! Don't ruin fish for me. As a pescatarian (apparently) it's all I've left. C.

Did you perchance mean Guys! Don't! Ruin! Fish! For! Me! ?

Anyway, being a pescatarian shouldn't cause any problems. I'm a capricorn but I don't feel the need to eat goat.

BJ

[csearle]

I remember hearing something about (I think) a reporter in Japan illuminating that culture's obsession with freshness with a description of a tasty fillet or two of fish garnished with an actual fish sans body but including head, dorsal and tail fins. As he tucked in he was disconcerted to find his garnish had been skillfully kept alive. C.

[DrBunsenHoneydew]

By Food Standards Agency requirements, "Fresh" fish has only been kept chilled on ice, and must not have been frozen.

[Lootman]

By Food Standards Agency requirements, "Fresh" fish has only been kept chilled on ice, and must not have been frozen.

So it can be six weeks old and completely rotten, but as long as it was never frozen then it is "fresh"?

[bungeejumper]

By Food Standards Agency requirements, "Fresh" fish has only been kept chilled on ice, and must not have been frozen.

That would be my understanding, certainly. Otherwise, surely, it would have to come with a warning not to re-freeze it? Some discussion of this (from 2008) at http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/sho ... p?t=686237 .

But yes, Scott's point is well taken about how many fish are immediately frozen on board the ships that catch them. Factory ships, they used to call them, and they were the embodiment of evil for the smaller guys who had to try and compete with them. You've heard of battery farming? Well I expect Captain Birds Eye's ships are set up for batterification.

Okay, okay, I'll get me coat....

BJ

[DiamondEcho]

I remember hearing something about (I think) a reporter in Japan illuminating that culture's obsession with freshness with a description of a tasty fillet or two of fish garnished with an actual fish sans body but including head, dorsal and tail fins. As he tucked in he was disconcerted to find his garnish had been skillfully kept alive. C.

'Ikizukuri - Live Sashimi Preparation and Eating in Japan'
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aDi-dlgukA0

I never heard of this when I lived over there, so can only imagine if it exists that it's a very unusual/niche thing to wish to do. FWIW it actually strikes me as the kind of crass/cruel/showy kind of thing you might find in Chinese cuisine. Of course, back in Japan, eccentricities like being served sushi on the belly of a young naked woman were entirely par for the course