It is all in the cut, and if you have ever experienced the sharpness of a sushi Yanagi hocho, you would know what I mean.

Now take a close look at the photo above, and what do you see? You see fish right, right. Now what kind of fish, I see three, two soft and one hard. The hard fish is “katai”, a term used to describe the fish’s chewy and crunchy quality. Now that is not really what is intriguing about the photo. If you are a surgeon, you work under magnification, and each cut must be to the milli-millimetre. But when you are a master sushi chef, the same applies.If you look at the photo, I will direct you to the silver fish, a fish I adore named Saba. It is fermented to perfection by using a simple brine.

See that there are two pieces of fish, and they are scored (by the razor-sharp hocho) in the center of the fish, a kiru, a cut. Now look at the two center lines, and you’ll see that the finesse of the line cuts are to exact perfection; both in thickness and in length.

These simple cut lines are used to open the fish’s delicateness, enhancing the refined tastes of the fat and acid of the fish. This helps give you the chance to appreciate the subtleties while masticating it gently and enjoying the flavors.