Pardon the interruption

The less said about today's basketball results, the better. But I was also too busy to see pretty much any of the games for more than a little bit (chief thought: how the hell did Illinois blow that one?), so I wouldn't be too equipped to comment either way. (Sunday, when I'm sitting on my ass for much of the day, will be a different story.) So what did I do? Well, among the things I did was go out to dinner with Alma, her schoolmate Justin, and his fiancée Margie. A good time was had by all - at least, I hope so - but the more interesting part of this as far as telling a story goes is that this was my first ever encounter with sushi.

I've never been a huge seafood guy, and sushi always struck me as sort of the "cool kid" trendy food choice in a way that always sort of annoyed me - it seems like the same group of people who gasp at "I've never had sushi" also act shocked when you say something like "I don't watch Arrested Development" or "I don't drink." That said, it's certainly not the fault of the Japanese that self-absorbed white people tried to claim the food. Alma's school is somewhat out in the boondocks, and Justin and Margie are from Hawaii, so they had been missing sushi; Alma picked a place in Chicago and we all went. I went with a touch of apprehension, as you might expect, but hoped for the best.

Normally, I avoid foods where the dollar-to-bite ratio is 1 to 1, but it seems pretty hard to avoid that where sushi, if not Japanese food in general, is concerned. We started with an appetizer of green onion wrapped in beef, which was delicious - I love onions, as we know, and the beef was amazingly tender. This was also the last thing we'd order that was actually cooked. It cost $7.50 and came cut into three basically bite-sized pieces. (Big bites, but single bites nonetheless.) Was it worth $2.50 a bite? It was surprisingly close. I don't know if this was Kobe beef (or the American Wagyu/Angus hybrid that passes for it), which might have explained the cost, but it was tender enough to make me think of it, which probably works out about the same. Even the most tender filet mignon I've ever had - and I've had some good ones - wasn't as melt-in-your-mouth as this. And of course, scallions = teh awesome.

The meal for me was the spicy tuna roll (which comes as six small rolls), plus individual pieces of salmon and crab. I considered ordering the wasabi-flavored flying fish roe - because how cool does that sound - but after seeing what you get it's probably just as well I didn't make that my first time. My previous run-ins with sushi (seeing it places, that is) had more or less given me the impression that all sushi looked like the roll type, with the rice and seaweed ringing an interior portion of fish and vegetables. Needless to say, this isn't the case. "Sushi" really refers mostly to the rice, and there are a number of different ways to prepare something that can be called sushi. (Oh no, Wikipedia citation!) The spicy tuna rolls were makizushi, but the salmon and crab were nigiri - in other words, a piece of fish (or crab) sitting on top of a small mound of rice which can't even be seen from above. I'm fairly certain if the flying fish roe had shown up like that that I might have run screaming from the place. Not that fish eggs are some horrible sight to behold, but there's no way I would have been prepared for that.

The spicy tuna roll wasn't bad. I find the taste of seaweed interesting, and I like the rice; the tuna itself was masked a bit behind the spicy sauce, which was kind of creamy. I found the sauce's consistency a bit off-putting, but it wasn't terrible, just a little weird. Dipping either end of an individual piece in soy sauce cut the heat as well as some of the sauce's creaminess. I'm not normally a big soy sauce fan, but it helped me out.

The salmon was the really interesting part because there's no way to pretend you're not eating raw fish. Within a roll, hey, that could be anything! With the nigiri, you know exactly what it is and can clearly see that it hasn't been cooked. I was a little freaked out on the first couple bites... but actually, there appears to be something I enjoy about biting into a raw piece of fish. Unlike cooked salmon, which tends to be flaky, the raw salmon provided a pleasing resistance to the teeth, and the taste of fish was fairly mild rather than overpowering (which is usually when I don't like it as much).

I'm thisclose to falling asleep right now, so I'll wrap it up by saying this: my first experience with sushi (and really Japanese food at all) was positive overall. I can't say I'm running out every night to make sure I have sushi, but as a once-in-a-while thing, I'm no longer in a position where I would shoot it down or fear for my enjoyment level. You see, this is why we have girlfriends - to get us to try new things. You think I would ever in my life have eaten sushi if I weren't dating Alma? No way. I'm glad it worked out for all of us.

Brackets will be updated tomorrow afternoon and then again tomorrow night. But right now I must sleep.