- [Seiji] Omakase, this word spread out
many different corner of the US.
However, imagine that this word of Omakase forty years ago,
nobody knew it.
By now, many people, they understand.
My grand master, he just said to the customer,
"You say, give me this, give me that,
instead of that, just trust me."
That's why he wrote down in his restaurant,
today's special is 'trust me'.
That one is our symbol, our policy.
We care.
This is what we call a moi.
This one is, like in Hawai'i, we call it a king's fish.
It used to only be eaten by king.
But the first I contacted, to research,
to find out the moi, I couldn't get it
because, like wild moi is almost gone.
We call this one the new technique.
We usually call it a kobujime.
Kombujime means that we cure by the kelp, usually.
But Japanese Hokkaido kelp is very expensive,
so I try to something different,
but same result of that I got kombujime.
So we use today's technology here.
Kelp powder and then kelp liquid. Yeah.
To make the kobujime fragrance at the same time.
I love everything, because we flavor it by ourselves,
so try to extract the best flavor from every other fish.
So, that's why we make different sauces,
different way to prepare.
Not like a Japanese way that we do
because fish characteristics is very different
from like a Japanese fish.
We've got to use something, like our own technique
which we developed.
First I started.
I used to use almost all the fish from Japan,
but started happening that like, prices like skyrocketed
because of international currency rate.
I cannot say to the customer,
"This one is $4.50 a piece.",
now you charge me $6.00 a piece.
I cannot say,
"Oh, those are international currencies changing.".
So, I start to foresee at that time.
Oh, I've got to start something, you know, more affordable
but I cannot lower the standard of my sushi.
My master told me, "Okay, try to move to Hawai'ian fish
as much as possible.",
So, of course you've got like right there
in the Hawai'ian oceans, of course the fish there.
Monday, we don't open at the restaurant
but we have plenty of time,
so we try to make new sauces
or a new way of the prep of fish.
Mondays are like our experimenting day.
This one is like a Hawai'i local octopus.
I made grated daikon, so you slowly massage like this
all the way again and again.
One tentacle used to take us about 45 minutes to massage it.
Octopus has like eight legs.
So, one tentacle, forty five minutes,
how long to finish up one octopus?
So, I just think a lot of things and then-
Okay, this is a massage shiatsu, so I try the hand massager.
I doubt first, but okay.
Let me try anyway.
I try and then first day, I got a result, same result.
So, instead of 45 minutes,
now I just cut down to five minutes, one tentacle, see?
So, eight tentacles is like 40 minutes,
but used to be one tentacle 45 minutes.
Sous vide, set it and then forget it, 24 hours.
I focus with my partner how we make it not a chewy octopus.
(Blowtorch being used)
I mean it is like a wave.
The reason is that octopus or squid or abalone.
Like very slippery.
So, like a kind of grab, like a wave cut.
We just focus and then once they eat it,
Oh, they're amazed.
How come this octopus is not chewy?
I love technology.
(Massager vibrating)
This is a local Hawai'i horse mackerel or jack mackerel.
First we bought it, fresh one, filet,
and make exactly like a Japanese way of serve the aji.
You know, jack mackerel.
Texture's okay because it is nice and fresh.
However, taste nothing.
So usually, Japanese chef, we do like the fish massaging
We get like grated ginger or maybe green onion on top
and the soy sauce, right?
But if I do, Hawai'i aji oh, customer knows right away.
So, we've got to think about it.
How we make the Hawai'ian jack mackerel
come to like a little of our sushi.
Maybe also this one a hundred times
on like a Monday experiment.
And then we found out, okay,
so, first we cure it with like a salt water.
Then, we marinate it in the like, herbs.
Homegrown, they're like rosemary, thyme, olive oil
and then like garlic olive oil.
And then we marinate it in that oil
because we try to imagine they're like old sardines
to make the Hawai'ian jack mackerel taste like.
So just, we do this way.
And many American customers, they say,
"Ooh! This tastes like a steak.",
because of rosemary or maybe,
so it's nice.
- [Takeo] We have lots of sauce.
This is Maui sweet onion sauce.
Jalapeño soy sauce, and also Tokyo green onion.
This is fermented red snapper, we call shio kara
and this is two types.
Regular papaya and Hawaiiian red jalapeño.
This is a homemade yuzu kosho.
Master Seiji's friends make it, so very spicy.
- [Seiji] I don't have a particular hobby anyway.
So, I don't play golf.
I don't do anything.
Just, I'm a sushi man.
That's it.
But I try to make more like Hawai'i my own grown
vegetables and fruits for my sushi.
To harvest it and to bring to my restaurant.
So, for example, like daikon, Italian basil, thyme,
mint, parsley, rosemary, and then kale.
Then tomatoes, some variations, carrot, potatoes,
peppers, lots of fruit trees.
Papaya and then the guava.
Cherry guava, chico, starfruits, mountain apple.
Even I have a peach trees we can grow in Hawai'i.
Avocado, and then now,
look at that lot of flowers for mango trees.
Lime, lemons, gigantic coconut trees,
which grow from here to that giant palm.
I do some experiment.
I can make a ceviche.
I've done lots of experiments,
because sushi is free.
It's very nice.
I can relax farming and enjoying the view.
Have a scotch and cigar maybe.(laughs)
(Hawai'ian breeze)
So, Hawai'i is like a heaven of the tuna.
Many people, they don't know.
How are there so many different types of tuna?
Bigger tuna, I'm using, yellowfin tuna, albacore tuna.
Many people, they believe the king of tuna is a bluefin.
Even Japanese people say it's like a bigger, yellowfin,
like a secondary.
Don't say that.
Yes, bluefin is good.
But they're different type.
This one is a bigger tuna back loins.
So, this one's got like muscle layers, you see?
Usually, the cut against the grains, right?
So, and then, when you see that like a piece of tuna,
you see there like a oval or like a white line or a grain.
So that things, but we just peel off this muscle by muscle.
So this is no grain. No resistance in your mouth.
Hagashi means the Japanese means, peel off.
So we got hagashi maguro means like peeled tuna.
If you eat this, it's gone.
It's melt away, because no resistance, right?
That's why I use a technique or the very-
This one, even in Japan it's very rare now
because the tuna price is so expensive.
We use lots of meat if we do that.
And so, maybe even today's young Japanese chef
or sushi chef or sushi man, even they don't know
that kind of things, yeah?
So, I'm very happy I learned this kind of technique
from my master, grand master
skipjack tuna is like a katsuo, we call in Hawaii.
I know they have a very fresh skipjack in Hawaii
in the early in the morning.
From ocean sprays to the fish company
and then we can pick it up later
with it so firm and nice and fresh.
However, not so much oil.
In Japan, you've got like a skipjack
with oil that are oozing out
and they're nice and tender and sweeter.
But here, the same skipjack, but we don't have oil.
So, what we're going to make this one.
So, we experiment like a hundred different ways
how to do it.
We just start to cold-smoke the skipjack tuna.
I built our own smokers.
Just like a styrofoam box and then like a Home Depot,
we can buy that kind of hoses
and then like , burning the chip like equally
and the cherry.
So, we just get it and then at first, we wrap.
We've got like a special paper to suck up the oil
and like unnecessary blood
We just slice it, sit them like that,
and then next day, the brilliant red color gonna come out.
And that's the time to make it that like cold-smoke.
Then, we start the cold-smoking process for 25 minutes.
Nice flavor, smoky flavor and the freshness
added on on the skipjack.
So, now we have but we don't know yet.
Maybe we're going to change it all
if we can find more or better ways to create
like a Hawai'i skipjack.
22 years ago, when I came to Hawai'i,
I was still young, so I could do lots of things.
Of course, like I want to retire right away,
but you know, time's shifting.
I don't like to be a grumpy old man.
Hawai'i king's fish, royal fish called moi.
We served with the ume sauce.
My partner and I, he has a lot of ideas.
I have a lot of ideas.
Where sometimes, like we do this.
No, maybe not, this and that.
Many many different things.
This is the freedom of the sushi making.
Quite soon, his time is going to be come.
Two different type of hikari mono.
This one's mixed together.
Hawai'i jack mackerel, we call that akure in Hawai'i.
This one is the oo-toro portion of the tuna.
We super freeze it, make it foam.
A little spicy, a little sweetness
with like a sauteed papaya.
My grand master and then my master and me is kind of,
they're almost retiring.
Once my time comes, you know, I'm older.
That's why I'm making sushi now,
but that's about the time to be shifting.
This is a Hawai'i octopus.
Old soldiers like me never die.
They just fade away.
It's okay. (laughs)