Hey, it’s raw. But that doesn’t make it simple.
It’s a commonplace that sushi is a culinary style that comes very close
to offering food in it’s natural state. So we expect it to be
ridiculously fresh, clean and manipulated only for presentation.
There’s a new-ish sushi place here in Portland, its tiny space
appropriately described by many as a jewel. Portland Maine you say?
Japanese cuisine in Maine? Then you don’t know just how much of what
starts out here in Maine ends up Tokyo’s Tsukiji market – the greatest
fish market in the world and a mecca for sushi chefs and other seafood
nuts. Ah, but I digress…
I have been a news junkie since I was a child, probably because we only
had one TV with rabbit ears. Every night after supper, I sat with my
dad and watched the CBS Evening News with Walter Cronkite.
Can we talk about how strange a yoga class in London is? Stretch out
your kidneys, she kept saying. Elongate your kidneys. Her British
accent easing me from one pose to another…but…kidneys? Really? I
don’t even know where my kidneys are. Honestly, I know they’re
somewhere in my torso region but to the point where I could isolate
them into a stretch. It was really strange.
One of the finest lessons I ever learned in my life was from my
grandmother, "Mamie." We were having dinner at Harry's Bar in Venice
many years ago on a warm summer night in July. My parents had given me,
as a graduation gift from high school, a month in Europe. I had gone
through numerous brochures and found the perfect trip, 10 countries in
28 days. I was exhausted on day 22 but Mamie was quick to remind me, as
I was slouched in my chair, my head nodding dangerously towards what is
probably the most expensive spaghetti in the world, that most people
would break their left arm to have the opportunity to have dinner on a
Saturday night at Harry's Bar in Venice. I sat up straight in my chair
and have always remembered her poignant words.
On our recent trip to Chicago, my husband and I found ourselves fairly
secluded from the outside world as we cared for my aging father-in-law
while my mother-in-law got a much needed vacation. With only one day to
ourselves – thanks to the brief appearance of his brothers – we decided
to meet up with some friends on the shore of Lake Michigan, in
Michigan. It would have been easier to hook-up on the Chi-town side of
the water (they only live 20 minutes away from my in-laws), but since they were off
boating there, we like to road-trip and I had never been to Michigan,
we tentatively agreed to meet in a small town on the lake called New
Buffalo.