Showing posts with label raw fish. Show all posts
Showing posts with label raw fish. Show all posts

8 Oct 2008

A Raw Deal

We have this lengthy debates, DVP and I as to what we should eat, where, e.t.c. This is mainly because i don't care much for food and well, he.. he does. The man likes his food.

Whether he has to go head to head with it, he will still eat it.

Our food debates should be something the Americans sits down to watch. I never finish the food on my plate. I think it is genetic flaw. Thus, anything i order, has to be something that DVP will want to eat, as he HAS to clear my plate. This, as much as it is a good thing (not wasting food and all that), reflects badly on my hard earned lady status, especially in the restaurants we frequent.

We have perfected the art of exchanging plates, the mafia could learn a trick or two while switching briefcases. And i should stop watching those horrible horrible films...Note to self.

Often, the waiter will come around our table and suddenly, the plate that was in front of me almost untouched is sparkling clean, and DVP's... well, almost still full. He will do a double take and give me that look. You what what look. I know not to worry as I am paying for the food, and where they indicate the time it takes to prepare on the menu does not indicate the length of time i should spend not that same food. Back to my story.

We decide to break our sushi virginity. And we pick Misono, famed to be the best in Sushi making, un-cooking, preparing... whatever they call wrapping raw fish. We drive into the restaurant's parking and the minute we approach the entrance to the restaurant, a Kenyan girl in a Kimono hits the gong. I'm halfway running back to the car when DVP announces that that is a welcome dong. Sounded to me like those they play just before the Master slices your head off with some chopstick. Again, the movies I watch!

We walk inside and suddenly hit by the sweetest aroma of some grilling thing. Definitely not rice. We are at crossroads. One side was the grilling centre, the other was eat your food before it realises its dead centre. A waiter stopped us half way. 'The grilled section is this way' He said.
Yeah, we looked like grilled food people. Maybe the can smell the type of food you eat when you walk into that Japanese restaurant. And all we gave out was auras of grill-ology.

We sit in the raw food section, and take the menu. None of the Yaki-s, taka-s, make any sense to us. The waiter has since abandoned us. I bet he left snickering... ' The fools, they want sushi? let them figure the menu out first! After a couple of minutes, i contended defeat and called for help. The waiter went through each item and after he was done, I had forgotten what was what. To be safe, we asked for the 'boat' which contained a little bit of all their food.

We sat back and waited. Now, forgive me for being deliberately obtuse, but it thought the food would take all of 2 minutes. I mean, how hard can it be to put a raw fish on a plate? You see, in my mind this is how a sushi kitchen looks like this :

Yes, an aquarium shop. I do not envision stoves, or chefs dressed in funny white hats and white coats sweating under the heat. nope. I only see this Japanese guy dipping his hand in and out of aquarium, snapping the heads of the fish, and sending the waiter off on his jolly way to my table. All variables remaining constant, i.e. no traffic situations between the kitchen and my table, i expected to have the food faster than I could say sukiyaki. I more than said sukiyaki, i learnt the whole Japanese alphabet, i also learnt that the Japanese anthem has the oldest lyrics/text from the ninth century, but the music is from 1880 and it is expressed in only 4 lines. After about an hour, i figured that maybe the fish were on strike and were fighting back or they they had ran out of aquariums and had to ask the neighbour (who happens to be the Sri Lankan ambassador) , if they could serve me his pet fish. Finally, the raw food that took forever to prepare, arrived. I was blown away...


In some eerie way, that boat gave me disturbing images. Of being out at sea, capsizing and the fish having a ball. And the food on the boat being me...and my sailor friends. hrumph! the shivers!

Then it hit me why the food took so long. The chef had to count the rice in each bundle and make sure it was exactly the same number!

I let that boat sail. Still almost full. It was a shame really. But it did smell funky. No offense. My brief flirt with raw fish ended there. Any food that looked like it was going to reform and rejoin like those bones in hte bible, and walk away from my plate...or slither in this case, was not something i wanted to eat. I sat there, waiting for it to walk, slither, flip away... it did not. After DVP and i established that fish dont play dead, we tried it. I wish it had grown wings and flown away. A perfect excuse, and also gets me out of paying. Do not get me wrong, i did like some but not a whole dinner out of it. Sushi, medarlings, is an acquired taste and a raw deal for that matter.


I think you can get sushi here though!

5 Jun 2008

Table for One Anonymous

Posted in Dec 2008.....




A couple of weeks ago, i rejoined the other fish in the market. After 2 years of being a fish in aquarium, a pet fish, I'm back to the display market.

I am floating somewhere in there. It is impossible to see me because the new fish on the block get moved to the bottom of the pile. You see, the higher on the pile you are in a fish market, the more the chances for getting picked are. In our little fishy fish dreams, all we see is this merchant coming by and getting captivated by our glistening scales, our strong fins and our beady eyes. We lie there and implore him with our half open mouths, as if saying, ' If you don't pick me up, this might be the last breath i take.'

This is not to say that our woes end with having a merchant possess us. But is the first step to a more fulfilling life. Of course there are those fish that i know are content on being in the market, but some fish, like i kinda like being a pet fish.

I guess what I'm trying to say is, I have said goodbye to the 'his and hers' club, and joined the Table for One Anonymous. I'm not scared of being alone... ahem....single, i just hate it. I enjoy sharing the little things with someone, I like being silly with someone who will look at me, shake their head and smile inwardly knowing that it's that exact silliness that makes them love me more. I like being able to have a lazy thinking day, when i have the liberty of asking ' Hunny, what are we having for dinner?' and actually getting an answer. Because you see, my microwave hates that question. And whenever i ask it, its response is not to work that day. I thought I'd solve this problem (of asking questions and getting answers) by buying an answering machine. Pardon me for thinking an answering machine is a gadget that give you answers!

I like having someone to call and rant to, who will, by virtue of laws laid out in the Dating Code, listen to me. I like knowing that somewhere, there could be this person who thinks I'm the greatest gift to mankind, apart from obviously House MD and blogging. In simple terms, I like being in a relationship.

I have not had much time to mourn my loss of status, the going back to being a fish in the dreaded market, what with all the traveling...but lost love is double fanged bitch! Once you loose it, it waits in the shadows, lets you have grand days and in the middle of the night, it creeps up and starts prodding you...

With Lost Love (LL) taking on the worse imitation of Freddy Krueger, the conversation goes like this

LL: 'Hey Dark, Are you awake?'
Me:'Now I am, who are you?'
LL:'Someone you used to know'
'Thanks for clearing that up. Makes it very easy to figure it out'
LL:I'll give you are clue'
'How kind of you, seeing as it's 3 am and all'
LL:'I used to make you smile for no reason in the middle of a work project, I used to make you look forward to going home in the evening when youknowho was around. I used to make the message beep on your phone increase your heart beat.'
'Oh, you'
LL:'Oh yes, me'
'And why, of all the 12 hours of daylight, did you have to wait until now to come calling'
LL:'You see, your days are too busy. Once i come your life, i don't let you walk that easily. I don't fight for attention. This is the best time to get you. Take you down memory lane.'
'Do we really have to do it now?'
LS:'Absolutely. Remember that day....'