365 Days of Japanese Day #5

Remember the shrimp image I used for yesterday’s post?

What is the link to dancing?

Well…in Japan there is a delicacy:

おどり えび
“odori ebi”
dancing shrimp

When my brother came to visit we went to a restaurant and I ordered it. To be honest, I didn’t know what it was – I just pointed to the picture on the menu and said これおください (kore o kudasai) which was what I did a lot of when I lived in Japan. It is a very primitive way of saying “this one, please”.

これおください
“kore o kudasai”
this one, please

The food was brought and there with the sashimi and rice and soup was the shrimp I had ordered.

And it was moving. It was alive! I didn’t know what to do…

I said:

やりかたをおしえておください
“yarikata wo oshiete o kudasai”
please show me how to do it

The waitress made a gesture with her hands of breaking something apart.

I was still confused.

In a flash, this young Japanese woman picked the shrimp up off my plate and snapped its head clean off.

BRUTAL!!

She took away the head and I was left to deshell and eat the still-moving shrimp. The still-moving “dancing” shrimp. It was yummy.

But that wasn’t the end of it…

She came back.

WITH THE HEAD!!

It had been deep fried.

I was still quite new to all this kind of thing so I gestured that I was fine and didn’t need it. In retrospect that was very rude, but you have to realise the whole situation was quite shocking at the time and my brother and I were just happy to have some sashimi, shrimp, and beer to enjoy. I didn’t need a deep-fried shrimp head to be happy.

So the waitress offered it to the other diners and one of them accepted and ate it with a big grin.

Later in that holiday we went to my favourite sushi bar in my hometown. The chef did おどり えび (odori ebi) for us. This time, having had the experience a week before, and being in a much more comfortable setting, I ate the deep-fried head.

It was absolutely delicious.

No wonder the person in the restaurant who ate the other one had such a big smile on his face.

Today’s image is the town where the story took place. Do you know where it is? I will talk about it tomorrow!