The Story of Sushi (14 page)

T
he following Monday the students set up for their second student lunch counter. Marcos wiped down the back sushi bar and dumped tubs full of ice into the
neta
cases. A stream of ice cubes flew across the top of the fish case and clattered onto the bar. Zoran closed his eyes.

“That was me!” Marcos yelled. “And I am sorry.”

The spilled ice began to melt. Water soaked into seat cushions. Pools formed on the tile floor. Marcos jammed perforated steel plates into the cases on top of the ice. He finally fit them in but they sat at odd angles. One of his classmates walked through the seating area and slipped in a puddle.

Just then Jay’s friend Jeff, the restaurant consultant, strode into the room. As part of his consulting work, Jeff matched up sushi chefs with restaurants, all over the United States. From time to time, he would stop by the academy and check out the latest batch of students. He’d ask Jay and Zoran for their assessments. Jeff might recommend the promising students for jobs when they graduated.

Jeff stood in the doorway and watched the students work. He’d just missed Marcos’s antics with the ice. Zoran walked over and stood next to Jeff.

“My phone has been ringing off the hook,” Jeff told Zoran, shaking his head. “It’s unbelievable.”

Every week this summer, Jeff had been getting more calls asking for sushi chefs. He’d never seen it like this before. What surprised him in particular was where the calls were coming from: Kansas City, Milwaukee, Des Moines, and Boise. Even Stillwater, Oklahoma.

“It’s exploding!” Jeff said. It reminded him of L.A. in the 1970s and early 1980s. But now a lot of the calls were coming from
white
restaurant owners, opening sushi bars in the American heartland. It looked like a whole new wave, the second front in the sushi invasion. A few days ago, Jeff had talked about it with Jay. “I give these people so much credit, to have the guts to do it,” Jeff had said. “True pioneers. To open sushi in Stillwater, Oklahoma?! Wow.” Jay had been getting calls, too, asking about the academy. ‘Do you have a school in Chicago?’‘Do you have a school in Texas?’

The numbers were astonishing. The restaurant owners who’d already opened one sushi bar in the Midwest now wanted to open three more, and the profit figures they cited to Jeff were way above what restaurants made in L.A.

When Howard Dean was running for president in 2004, a conservative political group attacked him in the Iowa primary by referring to his campaign as a “latte-drinking, sushi-eating, Hollywood-loving…freak show.” The funny thing was, Starbucks Coffee and Blockbuster Video were opening locations one after another in Iowa, and sushi bars were popping up, too. At least four restaurants now serve sushi in Des Moines and another seven sell sushi in Iowa City and the town of Waterloo, where teenagers order so many rolls that the chefs can’t keep up. When a columnist for the
Des Moines Register
recently defended Sioux City from the disparagements of a snobby New Yorker, she cited the existence of good sushi as one of Sioux City’s selling points.

Across the Midwest, restaurants serving sushi have been opening in every major city. By mid-2006, there were twenty-five of them in St. Louis, twenty-three in the Twin Cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul, twenty-two in Indianapolis, twenty-two in Cincinnati, twenty in Cleveland, sixteen in Columbus, thirteen in Kansas City, eleven in Okla
homa City, eleven in Milwaukee, ten in Wichita, and six in Omaha, Nebraska—and that was just the restaurants that had formally incorporated in each state. Most had opened since the year 2000. Even Peoria, Illinois, now has at least three restaurants serving sushi.

In Indianapolis, home of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway and a mecca on the NASCAR circuit, people aren’t shy about their sushi. “I firmly believe,” one writer declared in the
Indianapolis Star,
“that inside every red-blooded, beef-devouring American beats the heart of a sushi lover.”

Chicago, America’s meat-packing capital, has become a city of raw fish. Even a cursory search of Chicago and its suburbs turns up 150 restaurants serving sushi, sixty-nine of them having opened since 2000. Chicago shopping malls have sushi in the food courts. Fans of the Chicago Bears can buy sushi while watching football at Soldier Field Stadium. Wealthy residents of Chicago can pay $500 to eat sushi off naked women.

Vying for dominance with Chicago is Texas. The Dallas/Forth Worth area boasts at least 100 restaurants with sushi on the menu. “It’s not a trend anymore,” a food critic recently said of Dallas sushi, “it’s a near onslaught.”

In the Dallas suburb of Plano, the local Wal-Mart has installed a sushi counter. The Wal-Mart sushi comes courtesy of a company called Advanced Fresh Concepts (AFC), which plans to franchise 200 more sushi counters in Wal-Mart stores around the country.

AFC started out in 1986 with a takeout sushi counter in a Vons supermarket in L.A. The company expanded rapidly into other grocery stores under the brand name Southern Tsunami. In 1991, it opened its first supermarket sushi counter outside California—in San Antonio, Texas. By 1996, AFC had 300 takeout sushi counters in American supermarkets. Now it has at least 1,900, including locations in Arkansas, Indiana, Iowa, and Kansas. In addition to Wal-Mart, AFC sushi counters can be found in Vons, Safeway, and Harris Teeter, as well as in university dining facilities, hotels, and casinos. AFC even supplies sushi to the U.S. military.

Smaller takeout sushi franchisers have sprung up in AFC’s footsteps, such as Philadelphia-based Genji Express, which supplies Whole Foods Market grocery stores, and a new operation called Sushi Avenue, based in Minnesota.

A publication called
Japanese Restaurant News
estimates that the total number of Japanese restaurants in the United States has roughly doubled in the past decade, to more than 9,000. Some of those restaurants don’t serve sushi, but many non-Japanese restaurants do, at recently installed sushi bars. The chefs come from all over. Sometimes they’re Japanese, but just as often they’re Korean, Chinese, Taiwanese, Vietnamese, Burmese, Thai, Mexican, and Caucasian. A 2001 survey in Chicago found that nearly a third of the sushi chefs working in the restaurants surveyed were Latino.

In addition to the more than 9,000 restaurants,
Japanese Restaurant News
estimates that some 3,000 retail outlets serve takeout sushi in the United States, including sushi counters in grocery stores. These outlets have become so ubiquitous that many Americans, particularly in the Midwest, now get their first introduction to sushi in their local supermarket rather than in a restaurant.

To Jeff, the vast new sushi market opening in the Midwest held promise, but also great danger. Americans in the heartland had the potential to become more sophisticated sushi eaters than their predecessors. Right now, compared with the coasts, the Midwest was a blank slate. But it wouldn’t be for long. Jeff wondered if there was a way to stop the history of American sushi from repeating itself.

Jeff watched the students. It would take a new kind of chef to educate customers and spread the Japanese approach to sushi in America—a chef who had mastered Japanese tradition but who could act and think like an American. A chef like Toshi could yell and scream in the anything-goes atmosphere of Hollywood, but now, with middle America in the mix, things were different.

The stakes were high because Jeff saw another trend, too. Back in Japan, the younger generations were becoming Westernized. Japanese traditions were in danger of dying out. Eating habits had changed dramatically. A Westernized version of curry rice, imported via Britain and usually made with beef and potatoes,
had become one of the most popular meals in Japan, along with McDonald’s hamburgers, pizza, and spaghetti.

It was possible that if the authentic sushi experience were to survive anywhere, it would be in the United States. If Americans learned to appreciate the sushi tradition, they might be saving it not just for themselves but for Japan as well.

W
hile Jeff was talking with Zoran, back in the kitchen Marcos was inserting bamboo skewers through curled-up shrimp to straighten them. The shrimp were to lie flat on top of the
nigiri.
He stuck the skewer into the tail, just under the swimmerets, and worked it through to the head. It wasn’t as bad as the task Zoran had given them a few days ago. Zoran had set a box of large live shrimp on the table and made the students rip their tails off while the animals were still wriggling.

The muscles of shrimp, prawns, and lobsters are full of enzymes, and are prone to digesting themselves into mush as soon as the animal dies. That’s why retailers keep lobsters alive in their stores, and why sushi chefs keep high-quality shrimp alive until the last minute.

Shrimp didn’t join the elite ranks of sushi toppings until after World War II. Raw shrimp had long been a popular dish in western Japan. When Tokyo-style sushi spread to the rest of the country after the war, chefs in western Japan began topping
nigiri
with the raw tails of freshly killed shrimp. Some chefs also cooked “mantis shrimp,” which are not actually shrimp but a different crustacean with a strange, elongated tail.

Today, most sushi bars serve two types of shrimp: raw, fresh tails, which are glistening, transparent, and sticky; and smaller, cooked tails with meat that is firm and white with pink highlights.
Sushi bars in America usually list the former as
ama-ebi,
or “sweet shrimp.” In Japan people call them
ama-ebi
or
botan-ebi.
They are relatively expensive. The smaller cooked shrimp usually go by the name
kuruma-ebi,
or just
ebi,
and are cheaper.

The smaller, cooked shrimp are generally of the black tiger or Mexican white varieties. Environmentalists decry the methods that produce these animals. Fishermen catch them with trawl nets that also snag nontargeted sea life, including baby fish and endangered sea turtles, although U.S. fishermen have taken steps to minimize such by-catch. Overseas farming operations have destroyed millions of acres of mangrove habitat to grow these shrimp.

The larger sushi shrimp, served raw, are generally of the spot prawn or pink shrimp varieties that belong to the genus
Pandalus.
Fishermen harvest them from the wild, mostly with traps or trawls that are far less damaging.

Every
Pandalus
shrimp starts out male. He spends his first two or three years as a bachelor, during which time he generally loses his virginity. Once he’s had his fun, his testes transform into ovaries and he matures into a female. At which point, she turns around and hits up the new generation of strapping young males for more sex. There is some evidence that if females are especially numerous, the males can delay their sex change and remain playboys for an extra season or two. Likewise, if there aren’t enough females, the males may give up their bachelorhood and switch early.

The shrimp Marcos was working on were tiger shrimp tails, recently defrosted. Three other students joined him and helped insert skewers. When they had finished, the result looked like a bowl of seafood Popsicles. Zoran strode into the kitchen and glared into the bowl.

“What the hell is this?” He picked up one of the shrimp. It was still curved.

“Probably one of mine.” Marcos said.

“Come on, man,” Zoran spat. “What’s the point if it’s not straight? I
showed
you how to do it.” Zoran folded his arms across his chest and stepped back.

“Marination is up to you guys,” Zoran said. “I’m not going to say anything.” He strode away.

One of the students remembered Zoran’s saying that the sweet vinegar from a bucket of pickled ginger was favored by many chefs. They agreed that would work. First, the shrimp would need to be briefly blanched. Marcos dumped the skewered shrimp into a pot of boiling water.

Crustacean flesh develops delicious aromas and flavors simply by spending a few minutes in boiling water. Most meats can’t achieve such high levels of smell and taste without the application of flame or intense heat, and there are a couple of reasons for this. Crustaceans counteract the osmotic pressure of saltwater with an especially tasty and concentrated array of amino acids, particularly the same sweet-tasting glycine found in mackerel. Crustacean flesh also contains a high concentration of sugars. With the application of a little heat, these amino acids and sugars react with each other, creating the same sort of delicious and aromatic molecules produced in the meat of mammals and most fish, only at much higher temperatures.

When the students’ shrimp had floated to the surface, the flesh had turned from transparent to opaque. Marcos hefted the pot off the burner and hustled it toward the sink, shouting as he moved, “Hot pan!”

He’d underestimated the weight of the water. When he hit the edge of the sink his skinny arms couldn’t lift the pot over it. He pushed it against the side of the sink, trying to force the top over so the water would spill out. Steam billowed in his face. Zoran was screaming at him.

“Quick! Quick! So they don’t keep cooking!”

Marcos spread his legs, grimaced, and shifted sideways to get a better grip. Finally, the water streamed out with more clouds of steam. Then he dumped the shrimp into an ice bath. He wiped his brow and carried the bowl out to the classroom.

“Well,” he announced, “we’ve got some semi-straight shrimp.”

That was only the beginning. Several students gathered around the bowl to remove the skewers and peel the shells off the shrimp. Then, they sliced off any irregular flesh at the head end to create a neat, straight line. They trimmed the tail flippers at a prescribed
angle. They carefully sliced at the belly tendons until they could spread the shrimp flat in a butterflied position; if they sliced too deep, they’d cut the shrimp in half. Zoran hovered over them, offering pointers.

“You don’t
need
to marinate shrimp for sushi,” he said. “Often chefs in Japan don’t. But Americans like everything sweet.”

But you do have to wash the shrimp because they are full of shit. Takumi rubbed each of his shrimp in a bowl of saltwater, scraping his thumb along the shrimp’s tiny digestive tract to remove it. Most of the other students forgot, leaving their shrimp laced with poop.

Zoran stood at the head of the table, overseeing the assembly line. “When you guys start working in a sushi bar, this is what they’re going to have you do first thing. Lots of sushi
ebi.
”

Finally, they dumped the shrimp into a couple of bowls of pickled ginger vinegar to marinate.

Takumi switched on the lights over the back sushi bar, and the motley crew took their stations for the Monday lunch counter. They were open for business.

Marcos remembered the rush he’d felt at the Paramount Pictures party, when hot girls had flirted with him at the sushi bar. But since then, he hadn’t been able to use his status as a sushi chef to meet any hot girls. He was 17. If he were a
Pandalus
shrimp, pretty soon he’d be losing his testicles.

Sushi was the bait, and now he had some skills. He squeezed together a California roll and a spicy tuna roll and put them on a plate with a dish of soy sauce. He stood out on the sidewalk in his chef uniform and tried to look handsome.

Two women walked toward him.

“Heyyyyy,” Marcos drawled, “you ladies want some sushi?”

“Thanks, we’ve already eaten.” They eyed the plate. “Did you make this?”

“Yeah!” Marcos plugged the restaurant, but they walked on.

A pair of very pretty girls approached, purses and cellphones dangling. “Heyyyyy, you ladies want some sushi?”

The girls smiled. “No, thanks!”

Marcos gazed after them, forlorn. “Maybe I’m just not cute enough.”

After five minutes Marcos gave up and retreated inside. “Wow,” he said, “marketing is a
lot
harder than it looks. I thought everyone out there would want to eat free sushi.” He thought for a moment. “Maybe we need to get a commercial on Fox.”

Bored and hungry, Takumi sliced a few thin pieces of tuna and disappeared into the kitchen. Alone, he spread fresh tomato paste on the tuna, drizzled it with olive oil, and sprinkled on chopped chives and garlic chips—Italian carpaccio. The Japanese weren’t the only ones who ate raw tuna. He scarfed it down.

At the sushi bar the students were discussing what it was, exactly, that they were supposed to yell when a customer came in. The workers at the Subway sandwich shop across the street had it easy. All they had to do was yell, “Welcome to Subway!”

“It’s
ee-RA-shee mase,
” Marcos said.

“I don’t know,” Kate said. “I just wait till everyone else is yelling it, and then I go, ‘
Ra-ra-ra-ra.
’”

Just then a pair of attractive women walked in. Nearly in unison, the students belted out an approximation of “
Irasshaimase!
” The women sat right in front of Marcos. Now he just needed to impress them with his sushi skills.

Marcos cleared his throat and greeted them, a quaver in his voice. The women ordered albacore
nigiri.
Marcos pulled the albacore from the
neta
case, his fingers trembling.

“So,” the brunette asked Marcos, “how long have you been doing this?”

“About six weeks, I guess,” Marcos said.

“We used to come here all the time,” the brunette said.

Marcos turned up the charm. “Well, we’re glad you’re here.”

Marcos squeezed together four
nigiri.
He crammed them onto a plate that was much too small. He forgot to sauce them. He handed the plate across the bar. The brunette handed it back. “Could we get some sauce on these?”

Marcos blushed. He dabbed a blob of sauce on each piece of fish. The brunette popped one in her mouth. She grimaced and squeaked out a noise that suggested revulsion.

Marcos looked terrified. “Too much wasabi?”

“No,” the brunette said. She fished around in her mouth with her fingers. “There was a
bone
in there.”

“Oh.” Marcos hung his head. “Sorry.” Regardless of who prepared the fish, it was the responsibility of the chef who served it to ensure it was suitable to eat.

Kate’s mother came, this time with Kate’s brother. Kate served them a fancy roll.

“This is very pretty, baby,” her mother said. Kate smiled.

Later, her mother snuck up to where Kate was working and snapped a photo. Kate rolled her eyes.
“Mom!”

Afterwards, Kate grabbed some cucumbers, rice, and nori, and headed home to practice her rolls.