Catch of the Night: Taking in the Wettest, Wildest Show in Tokyo

One fish, two fish, red fish, blue fish. Dr. Seuss might well have had Tokyo’s Tsikiji Market in mind upon naming his book of rhymes. One might not readily assume that a fish market would rank very high on any city’s list of tourist attractions, but at 5 a.m.—the auspicious hour when a jet-lagged traveler is bound to awaken from a potentially harrowing tatami mat sleep—it is, alas, the only option. This is, however, a fortuitous turn of events, as the whirlwind market in which one can readily gorge each sense reflects the crazily paced city of Tokyo itself.

Over summer break, we lost ourselves in a maze of slithering unagi and feisty spider crabs. Before going astray in the market, we got lost on the subway. Tokyo’s underground network requires much negotiation from a drowsy novice. Luckily, my boyfriend and I made it to the scene just in time to catch the tail end of the aforementioned tuna auction, which is over by 6:30 a.m. We charged past pyramids of vegetables and some 350 varieties of seafood into the depths of a cavernous warehouse full of torpedo-like whole frozen tunas.

These massive fish, each worth thousands of dollars, were frosted over and steaming cold. Around them scuttled restaurateurs and wholesale buyers clad in overalls, numbered caps, and white Wellington boots, scribbling notes about the choicest specimens. The tunas were numbered with red paint to distinguish each one from its peers.

To the untrained eye, they all look pretty similar, if slightly fatter or slimmer. The experts are highly discerning, though, and carry well sharpened picks to test the flesh, even hacking loose a little sliver to hold up to the neon lights. Auctioneers stand tall on soap boxes. They rock back and forth on their heels to the rhythm of the bidding prices they chant until shouting out the winning bid.

After witnessing the spectacle, we retreated, goose-bumped, in the wake of the sold tunas, which were being hauled on miniature pick-up trucks to electric saws, where they were to be cut to size and de-boned. The tunas have immense rib cages from which the toro, the prized fatty belly meat, must be freed. It is lighter in tone than the rest of the flesh and has a silken sheen that made us drool.

We hitched a lift on a passing pick-up and were deposited right in front of a 12-seat sushi bar. The meal started with a palate-cleansing miso soup swimming with tiny, fingernail-sized clams. Two charming business men sitting next to us washed down their meal with a cool Sapporo beer each. It being 7:30 a.m., we opted for the more Zen option of green tea. After confirming with the sushi chef that we wanted “the set,” we sat back and took long swigs of the nutty, toasted tea in anticipation.

The toro was set before us. A parade of nigiri pieces followed suit at a quick march: pristine ikura (salmon eggs), mellow tamago (sweet fermented omelette), fresh-water eel surfing on a shiso leaf, pallid squid, yellowtail scattered with scallions, and tuna. According to the Japanese proverb, 75 days are added to your life for every new taste you encounter.

With a grin, our sushi chef daintily lowered each piece directly onto the counter before us—as is de rigeur in Japan. Apparently, those wooden sushi boats that are so ubiquitous in the U.S. never crossed the Pacific.

All of the fish we ate was of an unrivalled, melt-in-your-mouth freshness, and each piece a minimalist work of art. Our meal complete, we rose from our stools and stumbled out into the fray, moving on from a gastronomic temple to a Shinto shrine.