I can still remember the first time I ate sushi some 30+ years ago. I had been in Japan a short time and a Japanese aquaintance took me to a sushi place in Yokohama. Trying to be friendly, I can still remember trying not to gag and vomit as I placed that very first piece of raw tuna on rice in my mouth and chewed the rice while rolling the tuna around in my mouth before swallowing it whole all the while pretending that I enjoyed it! I did the same with all the raw fish that was on the plate that first day. Today I am sure they noticed what I was doing, but back then I thought I had them fooled into thinking I enjoyed it.
Where, when, and how I came to savor it I cannot say, nor do I remember. But I did and it is one of my all time favorite foods today. I thoroughly enjoy maguro (raw tuna), toro (fatty tuna) which, when fresh just melts in your mouth. I also savor ama ebi (raw shrimp), taco ( boiled octopus), ika (raw squid) and hamachi (yellow tail) which can taste as good as toro. I eat sushi at least 3 times a month at a great Japanese restaurant in Nashville, TN by the name of Koto. It is just a hole in the wall, so to speak, but they serve the freshest, thickest slices of raw fish and at the best prices in all of Nashville.
Seaweed, whether dried by itself, wrapped around rice with a pice of tuna inside, boiled in a miso soup, dipped in some kind of salty paste out out of a 50yen box as a snack, or konbuncha which is a salty seaweed tea, is simply delicious as well as healthy.
Both, I guess, are an aquired taste, but something I am thankful for aquiring. And they go great with beer!
