Sozai Restaurant

During these intensely frigid days, nothing can warm you like the comfort of home cooked food. You know the kind of meals that evoke nostalgia, even if you’ve never had that particular flavor before. Washoku refers to traditional Japanese home cooking. One of our favorite washoku dishes is chawanmushi.

We take our time crafting chwanmushi in our kitchen, switching up the dashi depending on what our chefs are most excited about that day. And truly, chawanmushi is all about the dashi. Hajime likes to use whitefish for this dashi, slowly simmering it for at least five hours to capture the essence of the fish. The dashi is carefully steamed with eggs to create a very rich and savory dish. Washoku dishes such as chawanmushi are a highlight of our Chiso omakase.

#茶碗蒸し #家庭の味 #ご馳走 #だし #美味しい #うま味 #和食 #和食レストラン

Many fish populations are in steep decline due to overfishing. When chefs choose to only offer the same few species as everyone else, they are contributing to this serious problem. We must take some pressure off of overfished species and allow them time to repopulate. When chefs shift their focus to underutilized seafoods, great things can happen. We can all enjoy wonderful seafood in a more responsible way. After all, getting to explore new flavors is one of the best things about going out to eat.

It took almost 15 years, but Hajime was finally able to source sayori! This is one of the fish he loved growing up in Japan, but it is sadly underutilized here because most people just don’t know how to prepare it. Hajime is excited to finally be able to share sayori with everyone!

Sayori is more commonly known as ballyhoo or halfbeak. Sayori is in season, so Hajime has been getting some really beautiful fresh ones direct from Florida. These are a slightly different subspecies than the ones Hajime would get in Japan, but they are equally as delicious. Their flavor is light and very fresh tasting. This is why sayori is popular as sushi in Japan. With fresh shiso and a touch of our house blended ponzu, it is outstanding as nigiri. As sashimi, Hajime likes to pair it with our cucumber sunomono. If you haven’t had sayori before, now is definitely the time to try something new.

#サヨリ #握り寿司 #酢の物 #美味しい #サステイナブル #寿司 #光り物 #フロリダ #旬の食材