Sanma Season

My friend Sachiko san came by after church today. I hadn't seen her for a month.  Usually on Sundays she brings one or more of the grocery store ads from the newspaper.  I have never had any success in getting the ads delivered with my Daily Yomiyuri Newspaper. It's in English you see and it is presumed that people who receive it wouldn't be able to use the Japanese ads for the local stores.  I learned to read pictures early on and some hiragana and a kanji here and there, so I quite like looking at the store ads, as I do at home.

So today's ad featured fresh Sanma.  These are a kind of fish that is very economical and only available this time of year. Sachiko described how she cooks them and how she dresses them and assured me that they are "Oishii". So, we walked to the area around Ichikawa Station and visited several different places.  Most stores had whole Sanma in a container on ice and bags available so you can put as many as you like in the bag.  They were priced per fish. There were also some pre-packaged and some of those had already been cleaned and were headless and gutless. These appealed to me.  After we made the rounds we returned to Y's Mart. and discovered that their price had been reduced while we were away! 88 yen each and some of them were the cleaned ones.  I bought two.These were for the grill, which is like a small broiler and is part of most of the gas cookers in Japanese kitchens. Here is a picture of them ready to go in:

They just took a few minutes on each side.  Note the cuts in the skin. I asked Sachiko san if they were usually split for cooking and she said that she makes cuts in the skin like her mother did.  She merely smiled at me when I said that my mother never cooked Sanma.

Had I been a bit more on the ball I would have added something a bit more colorful to this meal. But it was tasty enough all right.  The fish is mild flavored and comes off the bone easily. The rice is half white rice, half brown rice with rolled barley and a package of a mixture of 14 seeds and beans that adds a bit more nutrition and fiber. 

The salad was a mixture of lettuce and sliced hakusai (Napa Cabbage) with a peeled Nashi.  These are also in season at the moment.  Sometimes they are seen in Florida stores and called something like Asian Pears. On the way to America they lose a lot of their flavor and juiciness. Ichikawa City is the Nashi Capitol of Japan, and as we had a rather reasonable growing season for them this year, they are both plentiful and economically priced in the stores. Nashi for the uninitiated have a yellow roughish skin and when cut open resemble an apple or a pear. The fruit is quite crisp and very very juicy. They are quite refreshing in the hot weather. 

So, that was my dinner tonight. What did you have?