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Once an art form which took years to perfect, novices common in restaurants
TOKYO (AP)-- To Katsuji Konakai, sushi is more than a food. It's an art. It's a life.
Konakai began his apprenticeship as a sushi chef at the age of 16. Two years
later, he finally got to use a knife. It was four years before he was allowed
to serve a customer.
But those days are gone.
Today, the guy behind the counter is likely to be wielding a how-to manual as
well as a knife. And the rice may well be rolled by a machine.
Sushi, that symbol of Japanese taste, is undergoing a revolution of sorts.
Chain restaurants are the fastest growing sector of the business. Chefs are
often part-timers. Even the ingredients are changing -- try toppings like
fermented soybeans or corn, for example.
Traditionalists, of course, are aghast.
``Without at least 30 years experience making sushi, what can you really do?''
Konakai scoffs. ``There's no heart in today's sushi.''
But the trend is so overpowering that even Konakai has had to surrender. Now
80, he is an instructor at Japan's only school for aspiring sushi chefs, Sushi
University.
``In the old days, a sushi chef would roam the country for years with his knife
in his belt,'' he said. At Sushi University, they can get a diploma in a matter
of months.
Sushi has been eaten in Japan for more than a hundred years. But because of the
requirement for freshness, top-of-the-line sushi with raw fish toppings has
generally been served only in tiny, exclusive bars at high prices that varied
with the whim of the chef and the cost of the day's catch.
Improved refrigeration and transportation techniques have dramatically changed
that. Today, even bathers at hot spring resorts in the mountains can eat fresh,
raw tuna sushi for dinner.
At the same time, sushi chain-stores with names like Surprise Sushi and Sushi
House Dai-chan are rapidly replacing classy restaurants as the cuisine's main
producer.
Profit, not tradition, is their main concern.
Genki Sushi, one of Japan's largest chains, does not even try to imitate the
old-style shops. Not one of the company's 154 stores employs a professionally
trained sushi chef, and all fish starts out frozen, said company spokesman
Tetsuo Misawa.
``Our fish is cheap,'' Misawa said. ``Isn't that good enough?''
At restaurants like Genki Sushi, new chefs get behind the cutting board right
off. Other restaurants cut costs by hiring less-experienced or part-time chefs
and serving precut fish or machine-rolled rice.
After 43 years running a traditional sushi restaurant, the owner of Edo Ichi, a
sushi bar in Tokyo's trendy Shibuya district, last year replaced his
first-floor bar with a serve-yourself conveyor belt and slashed prices in half.
Edo Ichi's business has since tripled, and a second restaurant is in the works.
Meanwhile, the shop, straining to handle up to 500 customers a day, has
discovered the best way to get new chefs serving customers as soon as possible:
on the first day, show them how.
``Until now, sushi chefs were too proud to teach, and beginners had to learn
everything on their own by watching,'' said Edo Ichi chef Masaharu Tanaka, 40.
``We're now learning the value of teaching.''
On that score, however, Sushi U. leads the way.
Started in 1980, the school has turned out some 5,000 graduates -- mostly
middle-aged men making a career change -- who have gone on to work as sushi
chefs at home and abroad.
But in the eyes of their teacher, they're still rookies.
``People today think that sushi is just about rolling rice. It's not that
easy,'' says Konakai.
Konakai would know.
He has worked in the best shops, run his own restaurant, and served sushi to
two emperors and four prime ministers during his 65-year sushi career.
Decades of sushi artisanship have taught him how to judge the quality of a
piece of fish with a glance, the taste of a sauce by its color and what will go
with rice and what won't.
But, just as Van Gogh wouldn't eat his paintings, Konakai does not eat his
sushi.
Or anybody else's.
``I don't like sushi,'' Konakai said. ``I don't like anything raw.''
Tags : Maitre