Cooking

A very pertinent point. May I address it for you?

You are most correct in saying that (generally speaking) Japanese have traditionally been turned off by the smell of sheep. Yep, sheep - meaning mutton (adult sheep). Old sheep (mutton) smells. They have little understanding of lamb (baby sheep).

In fact, when I ask Japanese people whether they know the difference between lamb & sheep - they have no clue whatsoever. ‘Gourmet’ Japanese (what we call foodies) know & they love it as much as me. In fact, I hosted a party around a decade ago at my joint & I cooked (lamb) for 10+ punters. Happy to PM you a pic. Their smiles filled my heart with joy.

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Excellent work jr. And good neighborhood PR. The meat looks delicious. Good to see also no veg in sight :yum:

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show the lamb pics!

That looks magnificent JR!

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My cousin & his American wife visited Japan for their honeymoon. I put on a ‘temaki zushi’ party for their arrival. I even travelled to the docks & sourced the freshest seafood you could imagine.

Anyway, once they arrived at my joint, they stated that they hated seafood - mainly coz it was too “smelly/stinky”. I replied that we had no other food & could they at least try the dishes we had prepared for them. Well, not only were they happily shocked by the delicious taste, they sought out Japanese food during their trip. I explained to them that fresh seafood has very little smell. They didn’t know that. Go figure.

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Next time you do a lamb shoulder @JohnRain,
9hrs @150C… falls off the bone. Pulled lamb FTW!!!

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My better half insisted it was too hot to cook inside and I’m not surrendering to salad just yet so it was haloumi and mushroom skewers with other bits in a mint, lemon and oil marinade and a side of asparagus which cooks up a treat on the bbq.

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Tonight was salad niçoise for us. Takes a bit of putting together but it is 100% worth it.

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Photos @Shelton10 or it didn’t happen :yum:

Did you catch that tuna yourself?

Unfortunately it’s too late for photos. But I did catch the tuna. Fortunately it was already in a tin.

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Ah an easy catch then?

You can get some very nasty lacerations from those tins.

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Yeah it’s a blood sport.

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I’ll never forget catching my first SBFT off Bermagui.

Caught a lot over the ensuing decade, … but that was way before it was “Big In Japan” (Shout out to Tom there…:smirk:)

Haven’t been for ages but I’m told they’re way more scarce these days.

My one and only tuna catch was this northern bluefin back in ‘89 off the rocks at Cape Hillsborough on a 25lb handline. Took half an hour to get it in. I hauled it about 500m back to the campsite where some old timer yelled out "yeah, a few of those out there… pity they’re not better eatin’"
Actually, it tasted pretty good.

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4 hours at 160C tightly wrapped in AL-foil has the same delicious results, just make sure you take the foil off for the last 15 minute if you want a crispy skin

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Fair effort off the rocks with a handline. Good work.

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You cooked it or just ate it as sashimi (I would) ?

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Can’t remember if I ate any raw TBH. Probably tried it, definitely would if I could catch another. Cooked it a couple of different ways and fed a few other campers.

And I’d have to say that while it was a fine fish to eat, the somewhat smaller Spangled Emperor I caught at the same place topped it.

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People use all sorts of advanced technology to catch and kill fish. A lot of this technology came from the “defence” (sic) industry, e.g. torpedoes, sonar, etc., let alone cruder things like dynamiting lagoons.

So this is really: Man’s War Against Fish.

Hint: this is not an equal struggle.