“I busied myself with the seaweed, while Stephen pulled out flexible opaque salmon bones. After skinning the fish, he sliced it down the center seam, creating two pieces, which he cut into quarter-inch-thick slices. Then, like magic, he transformed a knob of ginger into a miniature golden haystack.
I handed him the slippery piece of kelp, which he squared off and placed on a bamboo sushi roller. Next, he laid several slices of salmon across the shiny middle, sprinkled it with a few threads of ginger, and rolled it up like a nori roll. After sealing the cylinder in plastic wraps, he handed it to me.
"Cut this into bite-size pieces." The sweet and tangy kelp yielded like a cooked lasagna noodle under the sharp knife, creating exotic coral-and-sienna pinwheels.
Next, we made delicate egg crepes to wrap around thick oily slices of mackerel that we soaked in a bracing mix of dashi, sugar, and soy. This was followed by a small "salad" of lightly salted white fish "noodles" tossed with salmon roe and lemony yuzu.”