Fantasy Sushi

Il était une foie.*

Yes, and so it began, once upon a time not too long ago, a prelude to the assault that was to come: a foot-long tube, two-inch in diameter, of pristine liver, Monkfish liver or Ankimo, cut into half an inch thick pieces, sprinkled with chopped spring onions and bathed in a pool of tart Ponzu sauce.

The scene was an unlikely storefront in a run-of-the-mill California strip mall, this particular one in the green Silicon Valley. I had been given a secret password to enter this special place, hidden in plain view, to partake in the sushi meal to end all sushi meals. Or so it was claimed. What ensued was not so much a meal but a fight to the death battle, ending with comatose diners staggering out the door in bewilderment, bloated in gut and ego, and with a void the size a month’s worth of London rent in the pocketbook.

The iron chef in question, a small Korean man with a sly twinkle in
his eyes –if he were French he would make a perfect village
native in Peter Mayle’s Provence. He was dressed in half an Adidas
tracksuit, the top portion of which replaced by a t-shirt bearing the
logo of the best, and most expensive, Japanese fish importer in the
area. A good sign, I thought to myself. The man worked the sushi
counter like the master of his own Lake Woebegone universe, one in
which any man who walked through the door was handsome, and any woman
not simply beautiful but worthy of a Hollywood studio contract.
Stroking an ego here, dropping a name there, meanwhile flirting rather
so wantonly to lady customers, as if helpless in the face of such
otherworldly beauty. A funny man he was, if a tad too quick to laugh
at his own jokes.

His way with the sword was certainly impressive enough, as displayed
on the plate of sashimi cut from an entire side of a Japanese flounder,
fashioned into a concentric circle to show off the differences in
flavor and texture as we ate our way around the fish. Good quality
fish, exemplary knife-work. But that seemed to end there: other
specimens of fine fish were not cut so much as hacked –albeit expertly-
into massive hunks of raw flesh, hardly fit for consumption in polite
company.

There was no denying that the quality of his ingredients was very
good. The Uni, sea urchin ‘roe‘, was sweet and bright, it would be hard pressed to remember
the last time I tasted better. When the plate of Toro, fatty tuna,
arrived, it was so permeated with fat that each piece was practically
snow white. Yet each was so large, it was all but impossible to savor
the taste and texture of the fish properly. I was taught long ago
never to bite a piece of sushi or sashimi, as the etiquette dictates
taking each piece in one bite. Here it took all I had to chew and
swallow quickly before the gigantic piece choked me to death, never
mind savoring anything. Other samples pristine fish were contaminated
by aggressively flavored sauce, like the plate of perfectly innocent salmon
desecrated by the cloying mustard sauce.

And if you were wondering about the rice, forget about it. Nothing
as ordinary as rice was to be found in such extraordinary an occasion.
Never you mind that the art of Shari, the preparation of rice for
sushi, is seen by many a sushi master inside and outside of Japan as a
large part, if not the entire point, of the sushi culture. And never
mind that the subtle tang from the vinegared rice would have made a
welcome respite from the relentless attack of raw flesh. As I said,
never you mind. This was an extraordinary occasion, and you had better
appreciate it, or you may never be let in the door again.

At one point, I had to beg for tea, as the thick layer of fat
coating my mouth was beginning to induce nausea. I was told nothing as
unworthy as tea would be forthcoming, instead there would be a bottle
of water. Not any ordinary water, mind you. This water, the chef
began his lecture, came from a deep sea fresh water spring underneath
an ancient glacier (or perhaps somewhere in that general vicinity.)
This miraculous water, he added, nodding his head to punctuate the
point, had never seen sunlight at all, and was the purest of the pure.
By that point I was so desperate even the notorious Paris tap water
would have been welcome, but even in that dire state I couldn’t miss
the irony that the water –that amazing deep sea water which during its
thousands of years of inception had never once been spoiled by
sunlight- came all the way from Japan in a clear PETE bottle. Regardless of the quality of his seafood, the place was beginning to smell fishy to me.
Not helping the matter was the bottles of homemade soy sauce on the
counter, which somehow ended up in your garden variety red-top Kikkoman
bottles. But they surely were homemade, the chef assured us. Of
course, how could I have doubted him?

Entirely missing from this meal was the delicacy, balance, and
finesse one would expect from a sushi meal at this level. In their
place was a pure and simple hedonism of consuming fresh raw flesh in
obscene quantity, Supersized Sashimi, if you will. Also missing was
the intricate interplay between a diner and a sushi chef. Sitting
right across from the chef, looking at him eye to eye, you should
expect him to do more than mindlessly cutting the fish, shaping
the rice, and handing them to you. You should expect him to be
mindful, to observe your habit and comfort. A great
sushi chef observes not only if you like what he has given you, but
down to the little details like how much soy sauce or wasabi you use,
and calibrates the quality, quantity, and selection of sushi properly
to your taste. Observance –we could say- was not this particular
chef’s strong suit. The pieces got bigger, the laughs louder, and the
Sake more expensive as the night progressed.

The meal finally crossed the final barrier into absurdity when he
broke out a soy sauce bowl with a ceramic penis attached to it.
Yes, you read it right. Penis. Judging from his booming, red faced belly-laugh
he thought it the height of hilarity. I was not so amused. Even less amused I became when the bill arrived, somewhere around two
thousand dollars, for the four of us. Yes. Again. You read it
right. Two. Thousand. Dollars. At that price, I expected the simple
perfection at L’Ambroisie, or the sublime philosophy of L’Arpège, or
perhaps to be taken on the ride of my life at Pierre Gagnaire. Here,
the prevailing sentiment was one that we were taken for a ride alright,
just not quite the one we were prepared to be on.

What is this place called, you wonder? Trust me, you don’t really
need to know. Just remember this: next time someone surreptitiously
whisper into your ears that he could lead you to that mythical,
fantastical ‘sushi’ place in Sunnyvale, keep walking. That white rabbit
isn’t worth following.

And the best irony of it all, here, this is the United States of
America, where dreams and fantasy of a democratic -and above all
egalitarian- universe find a natural home. This is not just Anytown
America, even. This hood is The Valley, Silicon Valley, where
meritocracy reigns supreme: your money isn’t respectable unless it is
self-made. So, isn’t it the height of irony that a simple delusion of
exclusivity -being able enter a place despite the Closed sign at the
door- still worth such a pretty penny?

Well, then again, in a town where your H2 is barely bigger than your
neighbor’s, it must be nice to have a sushi chef who keeps reminding
you, Chinpokomon-style, that you are the master of his pretend universe, with more money, taste and style than all, even if the boundary ends at the door, and -more importantly so- at your packetbook. At the end of the day, what is life but a
collective pretense?

Come to think of it, perhaps the incongruity of it all was worth it after all. And, perhaps it’s high time to change the tag line of my blog: Chez
Pim, I take it, so you don’t have to.

——————
*This line was borrowed from an ElBulli Book: texte et prétexte à textures. The foie gras chapter, naturally. I couldn’t restraint myself: it begged to be stolen, err, borrowed, for this particular post. I’m sure Ferran wouldn’t mind.