Sanma Kabayaki

There's always a first time for everything. Tonight was the first time I tried a 'sanma' fish at a local Japanese restaurant. The first time I was exposed to a sanma was at a Japanese restaurant in the city. Their pretty menu had a picture of the cooked whole sanma fish, shioyaki style, which looked pretty intimidating to me since the head, body and fins were still intact. The sanma fish is known as the 'Pacific saury' in English. It has a long, elongated and slender body and is a pelagic schooling fish. I have a keen interest on learning about the fish that I consume. So far the common local fish that I eat are coral cod, mangrove snapper, flounder, mackerel and leather jacket. If you hadn't already read my older post on fish, I am a bit of a nutter when it comes to fish but lately laziness has gotten the better of me and I have decided to take a long break from fish keeping again.

I decided to order the sanma this time because the dish pictured in the menu showed a sanma that was cut up, kabayaki style, as opposed to a whole gutted fish! I am always rather hesitant when trying new fish because I have no idea how the flesh would taste. There are several fish which I dislike eating, most of them freshwater species because they taste of mud and stagnant water, and pomfret because of their fishiness. I was pleasantly surprised at how similar the sanma tasted to a mackerel. It wasn't fishy at all and the flesh was nice and firm. The sanma is another oily fish (just like the mackerel) and it did have a distinctive smell similar to cod liver oil. Call me strange or what, but I do enjoy cod liver oil. In fact, I love popping the capsules in my mouth just to feel the oil spurt all over my mouth, and I then lick my mouth clean with my tongue!

Will I order sanma again? Definitely YES! And this time, I might go for the whole fish, shioyaki style!