Tsukiji sushi

Here’s another post about Japanese food; I went to the Tsukiji fish market in Tokyo and had sushi at one of the tiny restaurants there. I didn’t get there early enough to see the fish market in operation, but I did get there early enough to join a queue at one of the most popular places.

Queuing – they say it’s a British trait but the Japanese have their own take on it. Unwilling to accept second best, it’s common to see queues outside one restaurant when there’s an empty one next door. Similarly, I passed a long queue in Yokohama one day at 9:55 AM only to realise that everyone was waiting for a Pokemon store to open.

So, I joined a queue outside a restaurant that was no more than a couple of metres wide, with a single counter at which customers sat and ate their meal. Once inside, I sat at the counter with the other diners with barely enough room to put my bag down. The chef prepared the sushi and placed it on the wooden board in front of each diner, adding more as the diners ate what was already there.

It was worth it, 100%. The tastes and textures are so good, with fish fresh from the biggest wholesale fish market in the world. The only thing that takes some getting used to is the Sea Urchin, on the right in the top picture; it’s the soft and squidgy texture that doesn’t seem right.