"IKI JIME" . . .

[LLCC]

Umai!

I learned from eating many sashimi without use of any soy sauce or wasabi, that different fish takes different times to age in order to develop the best texture, flavour and umame. Groupers take longer than other fish.

LL

[swill88]

Here's an Ike Jime'd Blacktip Grouper (Aka Hata) to share:

Caught at 2pm, it was only put into the freezer when we got home at 6pm. Then after 6 days in the freezer, thawed for 2 days to Gyotaku. It was then kept in the refrigerator to age for 3-4 days before I sashimi the fish. We had another one sashimi on the evening we caught it - it didn't have enough time to age, and the meat was without flavour and umame unless soy sauce was liberally used.

It is beautiful.
Thanks for the info on ageing.
How did you destroy the spinal cord?

[LLCC]

Here's an Ike Jime'd Blacktip Grouper (Aka Hata) to share:
Caught at 2pm, it was only put into the freezer when we got home at 6pm. Then after 6 days in the freezer, thawed for 2 days to Gyotaku. It was then kept in the refrigerator to age for 3-4 days before I sashimi the fish. We had another one sashimi on the evening we caught it - it didn't have enough time to age, and the meat was without flavour and umame unless soy sauce was liberally used.

It is beautiful.
Thanks for the info on ageing.
How did you destroy the spinal cord?

Thanks! 

For spinal chord destruction, I used a piece of titanium-nickel fishing wire and threaded it through the hole made in the brain. the wire is led through the brain to the spinal column.

Even though the fish is already brain dead and bled for 15 minutes, when the wire gets into the spinal column, parts of the body started to twitch, which is destroyed when the wire is pushed through till the tail.

Actually any mono fishing wire will work. I prefer the Titanium-nickel wire because it straightens itself when unrolled. The stainless steel wire doesn't straighten up and sometimes, the wire will travel out of the spinal column. If you have compressed air on board, an easier way is to cut the tail at the caudal peduncle, sever the spine just behind the skull, and shoot a blast of compressed air through the spinal column from the cut at the tail. If you placed the head in a bucket of water, you can see the spinal chord get blown out and collected in the water as the air bubbles come out. Compressed air is fast, and for the squeamish, you won't have a chance to feel the fish twitching.

HTH,

LL

[LLCC]

After reading this thread, I got inspired to finish up a piece that I started some time back but lost momentum to write.
Thanks to your discussion, I picked it up to finish writing.
I posted it on my blog here:

Many years ago in the 1970s, I watched a black and white documentary on television of a tuna hunt by Japanese fishermen. Their bait was elaborately prepared from Flying Fish. After the tuna was subdued and brought on board, I saw they did some procedure of driving a spike through the head of the giant Yellowfin Tuna. Then in a few quick strokes, they cut the jugular, the tail, let out blood at the lateral line and inserted a length of monofilament line into the hole that was made into the head by the spike. At that time, I was more in awe of the huge sizes of fish they caught than on the procedure of Ike Jime and its ramifications. After all, I am first a sport angler, and I release all the fish I catch except those that I'm unable to successfully revive.

https://gaspinggurami.wordpress.com/2015/06/15/eats-ike-jime-and-eating-quality/




Take only what you can't revive! and when you do, make it the best that it can be with Ike Jime.

LL

[Keta]

Nice looking fish.

[Steve-O]

LLC - this thread has been VERY educational for me. I release most catches and now will put together an Iki Jime Kit for myself when I travel to Alaska to fish for food. You were right - not much English language info online for Iki Jime however I did find a few videos of anglers of several languages doing this to their catches as soon as they were boated.

The spinal chord destruction was the most informative part I learned and will do this on all my keepers from now on.

thank you for the enlightenment!

Steve

[Bryan Young]

Very informative LL.  Your website is great too.  Very informative and helpful in many aspects.  Thank you.

[LLCC]

Thanks for the kind words Guys! 

LL

[Bryan Young]

LL, if I ever get back to Singapore, I'll have to look you up. 

Singapore was one of my favorite places to visit...fresh fruit juices, pepper crab, night safari,...

[LLCC]

LL, if I ever get back to Singapore, I'll have to look you up. 

Singapore was one of my favorite places to visit...fresh fruit juices, pepper crab, night safari,...

Yes, do come. We have not much in terms of places of interest unless you're a WWII vet, but we surely have lots of food to savour and JDM Tackle to get tempted with. 

PM me when you are coming and I'll PM you my address.

LL