Chirashi sushi
chaotic and unbound

February 10, 2007

Chirashi sushi as served at Martin Butler’s the Girlfriend Experience

Chirashi sushi is ‘casually mixed’ sushi, unbound, informal, slightly chaotic. For Martin Butler’s Second Life-emulating, audience driven Girlfriend Experience at Mediamatic, I’m calling it DIY sushi. Chirashizushi (ちらし寿司, lit. scattered sushi) is the sort of sushi that you make at home everyday, not fancy, the sort of dish that your mother would make for you if you were an otaku kid, and she thought you needed some nourishment after spending too much time in Second Life. Traditionally chirashi sushi is eaten annually as a part of the Doll Festival, celebrated in March in Japan. It’s almost March, we can’t wait for March, Martin’s show runs until March.

Chirashi sushi as served chez Solomon with pumpkin and homemade kimchi

Chirashi Sushi Solomonova

• round grain brown rice / long grain black ‘wild’ rice
• yaki nori / yaki nori in packages (sweet)
• kim chi
• fermented black beans
• sprout selection (tauge, sango, chinese prei, knoflook)
• homemade cucumber pickle
• homemade carrot pickle
• wasabi peanuts
• sesame seeds (white and black)
• ume boshi (pickled salt plums)
• gari (pickled ginger)
• steamed pumpkin or other steamed veg like broccoli shoots
• zee kraal
• served with
• marinated tofu OR kasseler rib OR smoked (dried) herring

Chirashi links:

• Martin Butler’s the Girlfriend Experience at Mediamatic
  January 26 - March 9, 2007
• Second Life
• Soy story: food subculture club visits an exhibiton of Romanian otaku culture
  (soybeans are inherently linked to otaku culture)

debra at 11:33 | | post to del.icio.us

1 Comment »

1. So … very … hungry … now.

   My vegan daughter comes over on Monday nights, forcing me to stretch my vegan cooking abilities, and I’ll have to file chirashi in my mental list of to-tries. (The COVERED IN RAW FISH kind is one of my favourites when dining out.) Right now, I’ve got all these plantains, so I’m leaning toward something Jamaican tonight.

   Comment by Lisa Boucher — February 12, 2007 @ 19:42