The Taste Bud: Eating Frozen Tuna, Salmon at Home, Sashimi-Style
Almost like being at the sushi bar. Photos by Kevin Gibson
For years, I joked about the notion of the concept of “supermarket sushi.” Raw fish from Kroger? No thanks.
Heck, I even wrote a song about the perils of eating supermarket sushi. And then Kroger started stocking better and better sushi products, made on site, which sort of made the song obsolete. But even I know that you don’t eat the fish from behind the glass in the freezer section the way you would sushi at a sushi bar, with a real sushi chef preparing it. Right? Not so fast.
Let’s backtrack one more time so I can say that for three or four years now, I have been regularly purchasing frozen ahi tuna steaks from Aldi – they’re super cheap and easy to pan-sear for a quick and protein-packed meal.
A problem for a long while, however, was that in my abundance of caution to make sure I brought it to the proper internal temperature for safe consumption, I kept overcooking it. And as you are no doubt aware, overcooked tuna gets dry and dense and, frankly, not super appealing, no matter how you season it. It’s like trying to eat a big, gray eraser. Blech.
So, I gradually left it pinker and pinker in the center until one day I decided to just go for it – so I seared the tuna about 30 seconds on either side, leaving it bright red in the center. It essentially was the same dish you’d pay $15 or $20 for in most restaurants as an appetizer, except that there was more of it and it was, oh, maybe four bucks? Just add the extras – I enjoyed mine with white rice and some spicy pico de gallo I had on hand.
Seared ahi.
It was delicious. And I did not die of food poisoning.
So, I decided to do some Google searching, only to find that there are plenty of people out there eating Aldi’s frozen ahi tuna steaks raw, like full-blown sashimi. I said to myself, “Self, this seems crazy.” So I kept searching, and time after time I found more people on message boards like Reddit talking about how they use it without cooking in various dips or salads, or just straight.
And that’s when I found confirmation of the myth that the phrase “sushi grade” is not even official USDA terminology, just something many grocers will use to market their better cuts of fish. Actually, the term you’re looking for is “flash-frozen.” That’s when the fishing boats throw the fish immediately into a deep freeze as soon as they catch them, taking them down in the -30 or -40 degrees faranheit range; that essentially kills off any of the baddies inside the fish, while also preserving its freshness, and this practice is pretty much industry standard at this point.
(Interestingly, this is a method apparently discovered many years ago by a guy named Clarence Birdseye, who, yes, is the same Birdseye who brought us frozen vegetables.)
So, with this information, I sprinted (OK, not really – I’m 57, for crying out loud) to my freezer, yanked out a bag of Aldi tuna steaks and sure enough, there it was, right on the package: “Sushi Quality,” which is just the marketing version of “flash-frozen.”
I couldn’t believe I was holding in my hand actual sashimi. Maguro, to be precise. And it was $6.95 for a bag containing two servings – like, ample servings, too.
Of course, then came me summoning the will to go against what common sense – or at least the advice of our parents – has been beating into our brains all of our lives: YOU DON’T EAT UNCOOKED MEAT. Ever. Especially if you bought it frozen at a discount grocery store on Preston Highway. Sigh.
For salmon, make sure it’s farm-raised and flash-frozen.
So, against those years of learned caution, I took a deep breath, pulled a tuna steak out of the freezer and left it in the fridge to thaw overnight. The next day, I armed myself with my sharpest knife, cut the ruby red fish into slices, plated it with a side of wasabi (yeah, I had to go purchase that at Kroger) and soy sauce, and went for it.
And it was delicious, bite after bite, tasting and eating just like the stuff you’d get at your favorite sushi bar – light, tender, mild and refreshing. Not to mention that, for about four bucks, I had a serving of maguro sashimi that would easily cost $20 in a sushi restaurant.
I’ve had three or four servings now – but not more than a couple times a week, because of the high mercury levels in tuna –and I highly recommend trying it if you’re into that sort of thing; just make absolutely sure you confirm that the fish you’re buying is flash-frozen.
Also? Most fish is flash-frozen now, so those frozen salmon filets are fair game, too, although it’s wise to choose farmed salmon over wild-caught, as farmed salmon is fed a diet that omits the chances of parasites getting into the salmon’s food. Fresh salmon, as long as it’s farm-raised, also can be prepared at home to eat raw – just make sure to give it a good smell first. Heck, even frozen scallops are edible raw.
I prepared a Kroger salmon steak sashimi-style, and while it wasn’t quite as restaurant-quality as the tuna, it was still an affordable option. It’s just a matter of cutting the skin off the bottom of the steak, then cutting and serving it to your liking.
Of course, the higher quality fish you buy, the better, so it can’t hurt to seek out a fish market you trust, perhaps an Asian specialty market, and simply confirm from the staff that what you are buying from them is edible raw. Finally, here’s a handy guide that helped me feel better about eating certain fish raw at home.
But if you go fishing and catch a bluegill or catfish, don’t eat it raw. That’s just asking for trouble.
