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鮪の刺身Sashimi — procedure first, then a clean tuna plate

This is the most safety-sensitive page on the site, so it's written in the order it's built: selection and the safety window first, the knife and the cut second, the plate last. The plate is the easy part. If the fish in front of you passes the first section, the rest is practice.

Origin: Japan (Edo-period practice; standard in any kitchen with a sharp knife)
Difficulty: 3 / 5 — the knife isn't what makes it a 3
Servings: 2 (one clean plate of 300 g)
Prep: 30 min
Cook: 0 — it's raw; the knife is the cook
Total: ~30 min at the board

Safety — read before anything else

Raw fish carries parasites, and the important ones (Anisakis and friends) are not killed by refrigeration at all. That is the whole problem, and it's the whole of what this section is for. The four rules:

Buy sashimi-grade fish — that is, fish the shop has deep-frozen to kill parasites. The standard both US and Japanese food codes rely on is a time-at-temperature rule: −35 °C or colder for at least 15 hours, or −20 °C or colder for at least 7 days. If the shop can't tell you which of those has been done to the fish in front of you, it isn't a shop that does this.
Buy from a fish shop that turns over raw fish quickly, on the freshest day of its week. Shops sell raw-eating fish on a tight rotation because it's a perishable item a step further along than steak. A shop that handles "we'll do that for a home kitchen" without hesitation is a shop that does it every day; one that hesitates is one that doesn't.
Keep it cold the whole way home, and use it within 24 hours of purchase, with the cold chain unbroken. Fish that sat on a car dashboard for an hour, or in the door of the fridge for a day, is outside the window no matter what the label said. Cold in, cold out, one day maximum — on that day or not at all.
One knife, one board — for the raw fish only, for the rest of the day. Cross-contamination is the half of the safety problem you get wrong most in a home kitchen: a knife or a board that went through raw fish and then went to the salad, the eggs, the bread. The board and the knife the fish touched don't touch anything else until a full hot-soapy wash.

This is a procedure and not a recipe because the fish is the recipe, and the fish isn't something in the kitchen when you start. The knife, the cut, the plate are what you do after these four rules are satisfied.

Technique notes

The knife article is the second section of this page: one long, flat draw-stroke, in one direction, and the thickness of the slice is the difference between a piece of sashimi and a piece of sliced fish. The marinating article carries the variant of the page — a short salt-cure, koshi-ji style — which is a different dish from the raw cut, and worth trying once the basic plate is clean.

Equipment

A long, thin, sharp knife — a takohiki or a long chef's knife; a clean edge, not just a sharp one, because a ragged edge slices the flesh and the piece crumbles in the bowl
A dedicated board, for raw fish only, washed and dry
A plate, and two small dishes — one for the soy, one for the wasabi

Ingredients

300 g bluefin or yellowfin tuna, akami (the lean, deep-red center cut), skinned, in one piece
3 g fresh wasabi, grated fine on a piece of fine mesh — not the tube-gel paste; a small amount is the point, and its job is to cut the richness, not to overpower
30 ml (2 tbsp) light soy, in its own dish, to dip into — not poured over the plate, and not mixed into the wasabi; the wasabi is a condiment, the soy is a dip, they do two different jobs
2 thin takuan slices, or a few cucumber ribbons, as a bed under the fish
Optional: a small sprig of shiso, on the side, not on the fish

Method

Check the fish, again. Deep, bright red; clean, unwrinkled surface; a faint, clean, sea smell — not sour, not fishy, not amine. If the surface is sticky or the smell is strong, stop here: a bad fish caught now saves the whole knife session, and you don't eat a fish you've cut but not trusted.
Rest the fish, uncovered, on the board at room temperature for 10–15 minutes. Cold fish has a dense, cold core, so the cut comes out uneven and the pieces break apart; a fish at room temperature cuts clean, bright, and even. (On a hot day, or with a small piece, drop the rest to under five minutes — a cold slice still beats a fish that's sat out too long.)
Wipe the board with a clean, damp cloth. It should be cool and just damp enough that the fish doesn't stick as it's cut; a completely dry board with a cold knife is where the fish sticks, the slice tears, and the plate you wanted to serve becomes a pile of shreds.
Cut. The knife is laid flat on the board, blade down, and the cut is a long, slow draw from the heel of the blade to the tip — one pass, one slice. Aim for 5–8 mm thick, and the piece should come off as a clean, even layer, not a thin, flimsy fragment. Too thin is a piece of sliced fish; too thick is a piece you can't eat in two bites. Both are wrong, and the difference is the length of the stroke and the speed at which you make it.
Lay each slice on the bed as it comes off the fish, in a clean overlapping fan, deep-red side up. The shiso goes on the side, the wasabi in its own dish, the soy in its own dish — all separate from the fish, and none of them on the fish.
Put the wasabi in a small dish, the soy in a small dish, and the plate goes to whoever is eating it, with one instruction: dip the fish in a little soy, not a lot, with a small amount of wasabi on it. The wasabi cuts the richness; the soy seasons; the fish is the fish. A big pinch of wasabi on a small piece of tuna is the plate you didn't mean to make; a little wasabi on a big piece of tuna is the plate you did mean to make.
Serve straight away. The plate is the plate, the fish is the fish, and the person eating it gets to decide how much of each they want.

Common failures

The flesh tears, the plate is a mess of broken pieces. Cold knife, cold fish, or a ragged edge — all of them slice the flesh instead of cutting it, and the piece crumbles on the board. The fix is step 2 (rest the fish), step 3 (damp the board), and a clean sharp knife: the slice comes off in one pass, not two.
The wasabi overpowers the fish. It's the condiment, not the dish, and a heavy pinch on a small piece of tuna is the wrong plate. The fix is step 6: a small amount, and the fish stays the fish. If the wasabi is what's remembered after the meal, that's the plate you weren't after.
The edges are a little brown, the center bright red. The fish was past its window, or wasn't cut from the center of the piece. Brown edges are the fish oxidizing; it's a sign of age, and a plate that's a little past its day. The fix is step 1: check the fish before you cut, and if the edges are brown, that's a fish you don't serve.
The fish sat fine at the start but tastes metallic or off. It was fine when it went on the board, but it sat too long, or the knife was cold. The fix is the one in step 2: rest the fish, cut in one pass, and serve immediately.

Variations & substitutions

Chūtoro instead of akami. The middle cut of the same fish — between the lean akami and the very fatty ōtoro — is a richer, more substantial plate. The wasabi and the soy do the same job, but the fish carries more weight, and the wasabi is the thing that keeps the plate from going too rich.
Salmon instead of tuna. A clean, bright, even slice of fresh salmon — same cut, same thickness, same condiments. It's the plate to reach for when tuna is out of season or the fish shop is out of it for the day.
The koshi-ji salt-cure, the variant. A short salt-cure — on the marinating article — is a different dish from the raw cut: the fish is salted for a short time, rinsed, and then cut the same way. The salt draws moisture out, the fish is denser and more concentrated, and the plate is a plate that takes a little longer to eat. Try it once the basic plate is clean.
More slices, a bigger plate. The procedure scales to whatever the fish weighs: 300 g is two people's plate, 600 g is four, and the knife, the board, the safety rules, and the plate stay the same across all of them.

What to serve with it

A clean, bright bowl of cold rice, a bowl of miso soup, a small plate of pickles, a cold cup of sake or a glass of yuzu tea. With the fish, the rice, the soup, and the tea, that is the whole meal.

Back to Japanese · Techniques (knife skills, marinating, rice)