Tuesday 17 November 2009

Sake-fuelled cultural insensitivity

Mrs B and I were lucky enough to go to the Eat Japan Sushi Awards over the weekend.

We had a great time, ate some amazing, truly world-class, food and made good use of the complimentary sake and beer.

There were seven chefs from seven different countries, all with a very different approach to the challenge.

The Czech entrant made a 'cute sexy hedgehog for pregnant ladies'. The US entrant had infused his with soil and the Italian entrant had used only Italian ingredients, even the rice.

The event was ultimately won by Tomoyuki Abe of Japan. This wasn't the foregone conclusion it may sound like. All entries where truly amazing but his salmon nigri was utterly sublime and he was a thoroughly deserving winner.

The great thing about the event was that we, the attendees, got to vote for the winner, which meant we had to taste all of their dishes. I actually plumped for the British entry as I felt his entry really worked well together but Mrs B, being Mrs B, voted for the eventual winner.

I guess I have to concede she has impeccable taste in many things ;)

Part of the evening involved a maki (sushi roll) making demonstration and then competition open to a couple of members of the audience.

I was one of those members and emerged victorious, though I had an awful lot of help from my appointed sushi-master. Video below.

Unfortunately, in my sake-fuelled joy I ended up hugging him, I then remembered the Japanese aren't big on the whole body contact thing.

Guess that career with the UN is on hold for a while.

Eat Japan Sushi Awards 2009 from Adam Bird on Vimeo.

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