Cutting fish is among the most challenging parts for many home chefs and individuals aspiring to become professional sushi chefs. For the art of sushi, cutting high-quality fish correctly is vital, and you must know how to cut fish for sushi properly if you are walking your way up to becoming a sushi chef.
How to Choose Fish
Making an excellent sushi plate starts with choosing great quality fish. Here, we will explain how to choose fish. Let’s take the case of salmon. There are several points where you can check on salmon when you buy it at a fish shop.
Choose fresh salmon that has:
- a body that bounces back when you push its skin
- no slimy, sticky, or clammy skin
- no change in color (discoloration due to the oxidation of blood)
- no rotten or strong odor
On a side note, you want to be aware of the risk of parasites when you buy/store fish. Farm-raised salmon is safe when eaten raw because it is raised in a parasite-free environment. In some countries, however, wild-caught salmon is often preferred because of the growing concern about using antibiotics and food coloring from cultivation. If you want to avoid a food-poisoning risk from wild-caught salmon, freeze the meat at -20℃ or below for more than 24 hours after fileting to kill the parasites.
Prepare Your Tools
Undeniably, you will require a list of items to cut fish decently. You will need knives, a cutting board, a wet towel, etc.
Speaking of which, people often inquire about knives used for cutting fish for sushi. If you want to be a Japanese chef, especially a sushi chef, you should practice two Japanese knives – a sashimi knife and a deba knife.
A sashimi knife, or a yanagi-ba knife, is one of the best Japanese knives used in sushi making. It is the most suitable for slicing fish for sushi or sashimi because you can cut the fish in one stroke with its long blade. You want to get a sashimi knife that is thinner and sharp towards the tip. The recommended length of the sashimi knife is 24cm, 27cm, or 29cm. A 24-cm blade is easy to handle yet long enough to slice the block of fish with one stroke. So, it is good for a beginner. However, once you start getting used to handling a long blade, a 24-cm blade would quickly become unsatisfactory. In that case, a 27- or 29-cm blade would be suitable.
A deba knife is the other Japanese knife we recommend. A deba knife is specialized for dissecting and fileting small- to medium-sized fish. It has a thick blade body and gives strong power to cut through the dense bones of fish. Although it is heavy and robust, it has a fine blade. The blade prevents damaging the flesh of fish when fileting. You can find detailed information about knives in another blog here.
How to Cut Fish for Sushi
Here, we will show you how to cut fish into filets in steps. Let’s take the case of sea bream. Suppose that the guts and scales are removed at a fish shop.
- Make sure to remove scales. Removing scales helps keep the surface of the cutting board clean. If you dissect/filet fish when scales are still attached, these scales make the cutting board and the flesh quite messy.
- Cut off the head and tail.
- There is a film that holds jelly-like blood that needs to be removed. Cut through the film, remove the blood, and clean the inside with running water and a small brush.
- Pat the fish dry to remove excess water with a clean towel.
- Lay the fish with the head side facing right and the belly side facing towards you. Slice the belly open and use the edge of the blade to cut off the belly bone.
- Turn the fish and lay the fish with the tail side facing right. Slice the back of the fish open. The fish has been cut into two filets.
- Lay the filet with the belly bones attached, with the skin side facing up and the head side facing right. Make an insertion on the back.
- Turn the fish and slice the belly side open. Use the tip of the knife to cut off the belly bones.
- To remove the bony parts, press them with your left fingers and scoop them out with the knife. Do the same for the other filet.
- Cut each filet into two, the top and the bottom halves. Cut them into half, avoiding a line of small bones in the middle. Remove the bones in the end.
- To remove the skin, lay the filet on its skin, with the head side facing right. Make a small cut right at the tail end, but do not cut it completely. Once you make the insertion, keep the knife on the surface of the skin, twist the knife, and start moving toward the right while pulling the skin in your left hand. Slide the knife to the head.
Tips from Masterchef
The list of fish used for sushi goes on and on. Therefore, one thing that makes you an outstanding sushi chef is the knowledge and skills to change how you cut each fish. Each fish requires a different way of cutting it. For example, if there are two different kinds of fish with different sizes, there should be different approaches to them.
When you dissect and filet a whole fish, you get many bones or small pieces of fish you usually dispose of. However, They play a great role in making dishes like miso soup. You can also check out our Sushi Masterclass -Advanced- Course to learn more.
Is the Cutting Technique for Sushi and Sashimi the Same?
Little do people know, there are differences between slicing fish for sushi and for sashimi.
While you usually apply a slicing technique called sogi-giri (sliding a knife at an angle and slicing a filet to cut off a piece) for sushi, there are a variety of slicing techniques for sashimi, including sogi-giri, hira-zukuri (the most common method for sashimi), etc.
One unique slicing technique for sushi is called koba-gaeshi. This technique of creating koba (a little edge on a fish slice) is an integral skill professional Japanese sushi chefs use.
Suppose that you are cutting a filet with the sogi-giri technique. When you are about to cut off a piece, you change the direction of the knife to a right angle and cut it off. This method will create a unique “edge,” which makes the piece look more refined.
Want to Learn More about How to Cut Fish?
As you learned above, there are different ways of cutting fish according to each fish. Knowing exactly how to cut fish for sushi is an advantage as a sushi chef because an excellent presentation on a plate is an essential aspect of sushi. Our master chef explains detailed tips and techniques in one of our courses, Fish-filleting Technique for Japanese Cooking.
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