November 2, 2011, Lunch – Azuma, Dinner - Fish Soup

November 2, 2011, Lunch – Azuma, Dinner - Fish Soup

I try to limit my sushi to once a month, but with a great sushi restaurant like Azuma, that is difficult.  I had a 1:00 p.m. appointment so I went at 11:15 am and was the first person seated in the Sushi Bar.  It was a great day.  My favorite waiter, Robin, was working and greeted me warmly.  I asked for my usual and began reading Cleopatra, A Life.  Soon Robin returned with his hands filled with, silverware, napkins, a carafe of green tea, a tea cup, a glass of ice water and a bowl of miso soup. As I was enjoying my miso soup the sushi cutters arrived.  The usual head cutter, Paul, was not present, so I worried if I was going to get my usual altered assortment. The sushi chefs were in high spirits today, singing and telling jokes.  Soon Robin returned and stood by the chefs to let them know that he and I were waiting for my order but left again.  When the order came up he returned and served me a beautiful assortment of sashimi in a decorated plastic box. Chirashi Donbari ($13.95) is an assortment of fresh fish served with slices of pickled daikon and shredded fresh daikon on a bed of sushi rice in a box with wasabi horseradish and pickled ginger.  The fish slice assortment was perfect, 2 salmon, 2 Maguro (Red Tuna), 4 ultra white Tuna, 4 yellowtail (tuna), 2 Octopus, 2 Albacore Tuna.  In essence what Robin had told the chef was to substitute 2 additional Ultra whit tuna and yellow tail slices for the usual 2 slices of Redfish and Ocean Perch. I cut and ate until almost 1:00 pm and then ran to my appointment with the wonderful flavors of my sushi experience lingering in my mouth. 

I must make a disclosure; the owners of Azuma are my clients.  But I do not feel that I am unduly prejudiced in favor of Azuma  The walls full of awards for best sushi that greet you as you walk into Azuma attest to the fact that I am not the only person who thinks its sushi is the best.  When I asked my client, why their sushi is best they said that they receive fresh fish every day, sometime two times a day and buy only the best sushi center cuts of fish, not the whole fish.  I also guess that Azuma is more successful in controlling the freshness of its fresh fish more easily than other sushi restaurants, because its supplier, Seattle Fish, is located near the restaurant and can make deliveries of fish when needed and because Azuma serves such large quantities of sushi that its turnover time is less.     

Dinner was magical, also.  Suzette came home around 5:30 and we discussed having the Fish Soup we have been building leftovers for.  I suggested corn and potatoes and we agreed that a Chowder approach would be good.  I went to meditate from 7:00 until 8:00 p.m.  When I returned I was welcomed by a large enamel pot on the stove in the kitchen, simmer with: the left over clams and garden greens and broth from Friday October 28, 2011, the leftover salmon filets (diced up) with its poaching broth from November 1’s disastrous dinner, the leftover (diced up) cooked potatoes from Saturday, October 29, 2011’s lunch and a bag of corn we had shucked and frozen this summer plus some milk and extra white wine.  We ate it in large soup bowls with a glass of the leftover Wellington Viognier 2002, which tasted better than the night before and went well with the soup because it had more character than Sauvignon Blanc and less bitterness than the night before and complemented the delicate flavors in the soup, and a slice of the fresh French bread from the Greenhouse Bistro and Bakery.  Suzette is the "Queen of Left Overs", and I will be her galley slave forever, if she lets me. 

A very delicious light meal.  And we had three or four cups of soup leftover.  Oh!,  not another leftover, slave for every.

If you have been reading these records of our meal, I hope you realize that for Suzette and me the word leftover is not a negative associated with old inedible food, but a positive word associated with creative recipe planning.  Some recipes fit into historically successful recipes, like the Fish Soup this evening, but others are quite unexpected such as the Mexican open face Sandwich I created yesterday, November 1.  Leftover recipes are often the result of adapting available leftovers from one country’s Cuisine to another country’s cuisine, such as using an Italian Frittata to make a Mexican Cuisine dish served in a Danish manner.  

Bon Apetit