Children can be cruel sometimes. I remember when I was small, a girl in my class dubbed myself and my family `raw fish lovers', with a scrunched-up face that indicated to all that this indeed was not only a terrible faux-pas, but also smelt very bad. I denied the accusation but secretly held images of my mother chomping with gusto on a live fish like a sea lion, head and all.
As I grew up I made every attempt to fit in, learning Gaeilge, winning tin-whistle competitions, learning the Proclamation backwards - the usual pursuits of a 10-year-old. I found it strange to look at myself in the mirror, for when I heard myself speak I could hear an Irish girl talking, but looking back at me was a round, little Japanese girl with glasses tied to her head with an elastic band.
However some parts of Japanese culture I took on effortlessly. I loved origami and taught myself from Japanese books I could not read. As a child I would make flowers and birds out of the brightly coloured squares of paper. At my birthday parties we would show Japanese monster movies on original 8mm projected onto the wall of our sitting room, and wait for the reel to finish so we could watch the monsters ninja-flip backwards.
I loved the mountains of Japanese food which my mother prepared for us every day, sticky white rice and wooden bowls brimming with miso soup. I loved coming home on cold wintry evenings to big hot bowls of steaming udon or ramen noodles. A big family favourite was teppan-yaki, in which marinated pork, beef and vegetables are ceremoniously fried on a big hot-plate in the centre of the table.
In my late teens, returning from a year spent travelling Australia, we made a rare visit to Japan. I had been there twice or three times before, but this time I saw the country in an entirely new light. Looking down the street one day I was suddenly aware that all the people around me looked like me. They all had my hair and skin colouring and were all relatively short. This was my genetic homeland. For me, my link to Japan was now complete.
After returning from Japan, all things Japanese held immediate attachment. I set about learning all the recipes that my mother kept carefully catalogued in her head. I became her apprentice chef, chopping, washing, and drying with unquestioned obedience. Slowly but surely I learnt the wonders of Japanese food, the delicate flavours and the importance of presentation. This was when I really discovered the true art of sushi.
Sushi for most westerners conjures up that image of raw fish - whole, scaly, a single eye staring blankly ahead and invariably smelling the wrong side of appetising. But really there can be few places in the world where stinking fish is rated as edible.
The fish used for sushi should be no more than 24 hours old. In fishmarkets around Japan, sushi is served as breakfast, in the morning when the fish is at its freshest. Sushi is thought to have originated from China but the sushi that we see it today was devised in the 19th century in Japan. There are many different types of sushi: nigri-sushi is individually hand-moulded fingers of rice topped with fish: oshi-sushi is rice pressed into a mould and topped with a marinated fish; and maki-sushi consists of rice and toppings rolled log-style in seaweed.
In patriarchal Japan, sushi is strictly a male domain, where the chefs train for several years. It is said that the perfume on the hands of women tainted the taste of the rice.
My mother, finding really fresh fish expensive and not widely available, adapted her sushi recipes to ingredients available here in Ireland. In an adaptation of oshi-sushi she uses good Irish smoked salmon, while in seaweed or nori rolls she uses tuna or crab, with cucumber or avocado.
Sushi is very versatile and can be adapted to one's own taste. Though it may sound contrary to the concept of sushi, nori rolls can be vegetarian, filled with asparagus, shiitake mushrooms, or watercress, for example. The ordinary punter has tended to regard sushi as somewhat inaccessible. It is often seen as the fingerfood of the rich and famous, holding more "notions of upperosity" than a plateful of vol-au-vents.
However, in the new culinary climate, sushi really is a dream-food. It is easy to make, filling but virtually fat-free, and beautiful to look at. I would love to see a new attitude towards sushi, one that would see it join the ranks of the "salt-of-the-earth" sandwich. But that is not to take away from its special element. For there is the added artistic dimension to sushi, when one is making that perfect roll or cut where an almost meditative level is reached. Therapy that you can eat, what more can a body ask for?
Sushi rice
The following recipe is enough for four people:
3 cups of rice (Kokuho Rose, or Koshihikari)
2-inch strip of Kombu seaweed
1/2 cup (100ml) rice wine vinegar
1 1/2 dessert spoons of sugar
1 1/3 dessert spoons of salt
Wash rice thoroughly half to one hour before cooking. Drain and set aside. Add water (three-and-a-half for every three cups of rice) and the kombu. When the rice is finished cooking, mix thoroughly and allow to stand for five minutes. Usually the rice is mixed in a wooden container called a handai to soak up excess moisture. Any bowl will do. Mix the vinegar, sugar, and salt together until dissolved. Fold the mixture into the rice, making sure not to squash the rice grains. Leave until the rice is completely cold. Eat sushi by dipping in soy-sauce, using fingers or chopsticks. Have pickled ginger on the side, prepared by cooking with rice wine vinegar, salt and sugar, slicing thinly.
Green tea, or Japanese beer such as Sapporo, or Kirin (available from most major off-licences such as Dunnes or Tesco) go very well with sushi.
Smoked salmon sushi
sushi rice
smoked salmon
nori seaweed
wasabi paste (use sparingly, this is extremely hot)
Line a square lunch-box with cling film. Put in a layer of rice, pushing down firmly. Cover with a sheet of nori. Add another layer of rice. Smooth a thin layer of wasabi on the rice. Cover with a layer of salmon. Use the cling film to lift out the sushi. With a wet, sharp knife cut into neat portions, wetting the knife with each cut. Arrange neatly on a plate.
Nori rolls
sushi rice combined fillings, such as tuna and cucumber, or crab and avocado a rolling mat sheets of nori wasabi paste
Place a three-quarter-length nori sheet onto the rolling mat, shiny side down. Keep hands moist with vinegar and spread the rice out on the nori. Place the filling in a line in the middle of the rice. Smear wasabi sparingly above the filling. Keeping index fingers on the inside to hold the filling in place, use thumbs to roll sheet over. Try to keep the roll tight, and when finished hold in place for about 30 seconds to help seal roll. Cut into rolls between one and one-and-a-half inches thick, keeping knife wet with each cut.
All ingredients above can be bought in the Asia Market, Drury Street, Dublin 2, including rice cookers and rolling mat