How to Cut Hamachi for Sashimi

Learning to cut Hamachi tuna will let you to make your own high quality sashimi at home.

Tuna is one of the primary menu items in sushi and its sibling cuisine, sashimi. Sushi is either cooked or raw fish mixed with vinegared rice, while "sashimi" is cuts of raw fish without any additives. It can be laid on a platter in a decorative manner or served on a small block of white rice. "Hamachi" is the tender more mild young yellowtail tuna in Japanese and has a whitish color due to its high fat content. It is highly sought after and is worth asking for at your local Japanese restaurant. If you are looking to make your own sushi and in particular sashimi, try these steps for a successful and decorative cut. Does this Spark an idea?

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Hamachi tuna fillet
Sharp sushi knife

Instructions

- 1
  
  Lay the fish fillet on your cutting board. Look for the darker skin that should be on the tip of one side. This is called the blood line. Trim this piece of the fish carefully and discard. Make sure you get all of it. It is edible, but an acquired taste.
- 2
  
  Arrange the tuna where the grain goes diagonally from the upper left towards the right. Cut it to where it is about the thickness of a fingertip and about 8 inches long and 3 inches wide.
- 3
  
  Hold your knife at a 45-degree angle. Place it on the fish with the tip resting at about two o'clock and the handle of the knife at the lower edge. If you look at the grain of the fish as compared to the knife, it should make an "X" shape.
- 4
  
  Angling down at 45 degrees, cut off the edge of the rectangular fillet. Then move over another 1/2 inch and repeat the same cut. This creates a slice that allows the grain to be revealed horizontally.

Tips & Warnings

Dress your hamachi tuna with smoked mayonnaise or lime juice to boost its flavor.
Make sure your surfaces and your knives are clean -- very important when dealing with raw fish.