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by tptacek 1516 days ago
Taking Momotaro as a sort of baseline for high-end but not Omakase-only sushi in Chicago, akami is $7 ($14), chutoro is $11 ($22) and otoro $13 ($26). The otoro will melt, but the chutoro will have the same texture as the sake and the akami will be leaner and have more texture; all 3 are maguro, and all 3 are more expensive than sake. :)

I prefer sake to akami and chutoro; it is hard to beat otoro.

I can see how sake is a gateway fish! But the implication seems to be that instead of eating salmon, for the real deal we should be eating bluefin. That seems dumb; both salmon and bluefin are pretty boring, they all occupy sort of the same place in Japanese cooking as sesame chicken does in American Chinese food. Everything else is better!
2 comments
djtango 1516 days ago
Everything is a spectrum but I've eaten kaitenzushi in Japan that cost 1100-2500JPY per person that would have cost 5-10x that outside Japan and wouldn't have been nearly as good.

I've found salmon and tuna can approach the level that might be passable in Japan but everything else (swordfish, mackerel, crab, clam etc etc) are whole leagues better in Japan than outside.

I currently live in Singapore where the sushi is actually pretty good but definitely not as good as Japan.

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skhr0680 1516 days ago
In Japanese:

Sake: domestic fish, is never sold as sashimi

Salmon: imported fish

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tptacek 1516 days ago
Interesting; on any menu in Chicago (esp. the high-end places), sake = salmon.
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kalimanzaro 1516 days ago
Truth is more nuanced than that. Japanese have a native word 'sake' for the native salmon that is hardly eaten nowadays. They definitely use the word sake for imported salmon too, especially if its cooked ( because thats how they usually eat the ol native salmon too) They tend to call raw salmon 'sahmon' though.

I dont know if its a folk wisdom but the following article claims that when they hear the word sake they think of that old native salmon.

Sort of like when you might call any old man 'Gramps' but when you hear 'Gramps' you think of your own grandfather?

https://tokyoflyfishing.com/fish/chum-salmon-sake-or-shiroza...

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