Fish

Here's another method for sardines, thanks to Chef Isao Yamada: Marinate them in vinegar. In my last post I mentioned I wanted to learn more Japanese sardine preparations, to give me some options for this flavorful but underappreciated fish (at least in America).

Here's another amazing dish I cooked during my recent session with Chef Isao Yamada. I asked him to teach me a method for sardines, a delicious (and sustainable) fish that I feel more of us should be eating.

God, this looks good, doesn't it? And it's just the leftovers! When I saw local tuna for sale at the farmers market, I remembered a technique the amazing Tadashi Ono taught me called maguro zuke, an old Tokyo style of marinating tuna, which he serves to great acclaim at Matsuri restaurant.

I realize it's a little late for barbecue (at least in NYC), but I want to share this method, which you can also do on the stovetop using a skillet. I learned it from my friend and grill-master-of-the-universe, Chef Tadashi Ono of Matsuri. Sure, we wrote a hot pot cookbook together, but you gotta see this guy in action on the Weber.

Melissa Clark's excellent article on cooking bluefish that appeared recently in the N.Y. Times got me thinking about preparing oily fish, Japanese-style.

At a recent master class for chefs at New York's James Beard Foundation (organized by the Gohan Foundation -- thanks to both for the invite), Chef Toshio Suzuki of Sushi Zen introduced Japanese vinegar and talked about its uses. He covered a lot of fascinating ground but to me the highlight was his treatment of mackerel. Simple but so subtle and delicious.

Here's why you need to befriend your local fishmonger, and fast: Tuna collar. Chef Ono of Matsuri and I donned hair nets and white smocks to visit a fish wholesaler located beside Newark Airport yesterday.

Monkfish are huge, ugly and incredibly tasty. I first came face to face with one in Akita Prefecture last year (more on that below). Today I got to watch Chef Masaharu Morimoto of Iron Chef fame dramatically offer this fish as the sacrificial lamb of his demonstration at the annual StarChefs Congress.

On his last morning at my apartment, Atsushi explained this dish to me. First, let's talk about iriko dashi, a traditional dashi prepared from small dried fish. While konbu and katsuobushi dashi is intricate and involved, iriko dashi is the opposite: Totally simple to make.

Here's another dish that makes use of the invaluable otoshibuta. Atsushi and I picked up a small whole sea bass from the farmers market, so fresh its eyes were crystal clear and gills bright red. We cleaned and scaled it and decided to simmer it whole, something I've wanted to learn how to do.

At the farmers market, Atsushi and I spotted local Long Island Sound flounder, in peak season right now. I asked him how to prepare this delicately fish and he suggested poaching it in sake and salt, a simple method to subtly and elegantly express its flavors. We picked up a bunch, iced them down, and brought them over to Chef Tadashi Ono's house to prepare for his family (hey, I wan't the only enjoying Atsushi's cooking!).

Atsushi and I hit the Union Square farmers market a few times during his stay. On Saturday and Wednesdays fishermen from Long Island's North Fork sell pristine seafood. On one of those mornings we spotted a majestic whole bonito on ice. We quickly snapped it up.