Chirashi Bowl

Most of my trips to Fairbanks allow me to hit up restaurants not otherwise available in the Delta Greely area. Usually these are ethnic in nature; thai, chinese, and most importantly japanese. Hollie and I spent quite a few nights in the sushi restaurants in Columbia and had thai food nearly everyday on our trip to California last summer. Literally the first day I landed in Alaska, Richard and I hit up his favorite sushi joint and since the quality was good I haven't had a reason to stray from it. Monday, I ran up to Fairbanks to pick up our Boaters Ed instructor coming out of Anchorage for a class this week. I took the opportunity to do a few hours of shopping for essentials you can't get in Delta Greely and to hit Asianas. I had a salmon salad and a chirashi bowl, pronounce 'chur-ah-she'. My friend Mike Matese introduced me to the chirachi bowl a few years back and I try to get it when i can. In general a chirachi bowl is a mix of sashimi, raw fish slices, sitting on top of rice. The seafood most often used is tuna, salmon, yellowtail, octopus or squid, eel and shrimp or crab or any combination thereof. The Chirashi at Asianas comes covered in salad and has some sliced japanese vegetables on top as well as a scattering of fish roe. It also comes with wasabi and pickled ginger root slices like most sushi. It was heavenly. I don't think it's the best chirashi bowl I've ever had, but that doesn't matter. Dick Proesell talk about food being best when seasoned with a little hunger. Or you could apply the old adage that variety is the spice of life. Either way, I've realized again that we can so easily become spoiled when we have everything readily at our fingertips and it's good to give things up for awhile every so often because when you get them back, it makes them that much sweeter.