21/7 Ian - Unfinished fishy business (part 2)

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Originally uploaded by blenkers

The past 24 hours has really taken it to a whole new level though. We’re currently on route from Matsuyama to Hiroshima on a ferry, having spent the night at Dogo Onsen spa town (which I’m sure Claz will be filling you in about sometime soon). When we arrived at our ryokan we were pretty horrified – probably one of the grimmest hotels we’ve ever stayed in. And of course, being flashpackers, we are also swanky hotel snobs. The room itself was ok though, but we weren’t prepared for the feasts (note the plural, with as much amazement, disbelief and horror as we did) that were presented to us for dinner, and then breakfast the following morning. Take a look at those pictures if you don’t believe me. That’s for two people. Turns out Miyake-san back in Naoshima was a tight-arsed, drunken, lazy old get.

So, over the course of my last lunch, dinner and breakfast meals, I have consumed the following fishy business:

• Octopus (purple skin, cute little suckers on the tentacles, cooked)
• Lobster (cooked)
• Crabs legs (those big ones I was talking about from Tokyo fish market, cooked)
• Big balls of bright orange roe (fishy and fragrant, delightful, they pop in your mouth!)
• Squid (sashimi - raw fish - it becomes sushi with the rice bit with it)
• Tuna (sashimi)
• Unspecified grey coloured fish (sashimi)
• Unspecified white coloured fish (sashimi)
• Salmon (sashimi)
• Salmon (cooked)
• Prawns (just to say pink, almost sashimi)
• Prawns (cooked)
• Mussels (or similar, cooked and in a pickled sauce)
• Small, whole sardine looking chap, but bigger (pickled and cooked)
• Tiny, whole whitebait looking stuff, only smaller (possibly dried, for breakfast?!)
• Mackerel (cooked, in a soup that you added a whole raw egg to yourself)
• Unspecified white coloured fish (cooked in tempura batter)

Now for a kid who thought mushrooms were disgusting, and up until about a year ago wouldn’t touch prawns unless he was paid handsomely, that is not bad going. Nor did I gip, not even once. It’s fair enough to say that in Japan, Bourdain-esque culinary adventures are to be had around every corner, so long as you’re prepared to take a deep slug of Japanese beer (Kirin or Asahi recommended), chase with a swig of sake to strengthen your resolve, and get stuck in.

Although I’m still not eating anything which is still moving when presented to me though, or any fermented raw fish. No way.

Onward.