Cool Link – Fssshhhh!
That subject line is the punch line to the joke, "What do you call a fish with with no eyes?"
Ad Blankestijn (still embarassingly unsure how to pronounce that name) has started a Fish O’ Japan Almanac beginning with aji. Really interesting stuff, and HOLY SHIT am I excited to eat some anko (Blackmouth Angler) this winter. I had no idea those things were edible. The only thing he could do better would be to provide the kanji, although to be honest you don’t have to write the kanji when you order at a sushi restaurant, and often fish names are written in katakana because fish kanji are so obscure, so if you want to bone up on your fish vocab, head over to Japan Navigator.
October 23rd, 2008 at 7:23 pm
Apparently the liver is the best part of Anko. An interesting bit of trivia is that the fish are so squishy and tricky that you can’t cut them up on a chopping board. You have to hang it from a hook and cut it up in mid air. It looks rather tricky. Having said all that, I’ve never tried one because I would feel bad about it. Not sure why… Are they endangered?
October 24th, 2008 at 7:14 am
I wouldn’t feel bad, although to be honest I’m not sure I could stomach it – they are pretty coddamn ugly!