My first time making sushi

I’d watched the videos. I’d read the instruction guides. I was ready to make sushi. The problem is, I didn’t know where to find sushi fish. The only straightforward-looking website that came up for me was www.wagyuman.com. His specialty was wagyu beef imported directly from Japanese farmers, but he was also selling sushi fish. I got over-excited, and upon looking at the options, decided to buy two hamachi loins and a 3 pound block of otoro. I don’t remember exactly what I was thinking, but it was something like “well, the fish is going to be frozen, so fuck it, why not?”. It was, unsurprisingly, very expensive, but I was too excited to care.

When the box came, I opened it immediately, and the moment I did, I knew I’d made a big mistake. The otoro block was as long as my torso, and the hamachi loins weren’t much smaller. Even if I only defrosted one of those packages at a time, it’d be too much fish for my wife and I to eat in a single sitting, and the fish I wouldn’t defrost filled whatever remaining space I had in my freezer.

I’m going to try to smile while I figure out what I’m gonna do with all this fish

Thankfully, I remembered that my parents, aunt and uncle were planning on having a family get-together where they were going to order sushi anyway. We were not invited. I embarrassingly called my mom and told her about my little problem, and asked if we could come over and make sushi there instead. After laughing at me, she agreed.

It was a family effort. I’d given my mom the sushi rice ingredients the day before, as well as sushi rice vinegar, so that she could make the rice while we brought the fish so that it could all be ready at the same time. Everyone had a had at slicing the toro, which made me anxious because I was supposed to be the one that knew what I was doing, and despite watching many YouTube videos and reading plenty of guides, I felt clueless.

I still haven’t bought better quality otoro than I did that day

The sushi quality definitely reflected our lack of experience. The rolls fell apart, the nigiri looked like a child’s drawing of sushi, and our attempts to use the oshibako (sushi press) just made a mess. Still, everything tasted delicious, and we had a great time. Most importantly, I learned a valuable lesson that day: Even ugly sushi can be delicious.

My family enjoying the ugly sushi!