http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iw0yfiRz9zY

You might want to rethink that stance.

Traditionally, dashi is made with only kombu and either bonito flakes (katsuobushi), sardines (niboshi) or shiitake. The bonito type is most common. Other fish parts, shrimp heads, crab, etc. wouldn't be part of the dashi (stock), but would be added later. In particular, a Japanese chef would never use sockeye trimmings due to the strong flavor. You can certainly make a delicious fish stock with all sorts of fish parts, it just isn't what most Japanese would consider dashi. Having said this, it is pretty rare in Japan, except at fairly upscale restaurants, for people to make their own dashi anymore. They typically use "hondashi" or some other powder that is just added to water. For those who make their own dashi, I would guess 99%+ use only kombu and bonito flakes.

Regarding the other comments about akamiso, I would concur with the poster who said it isn't a matter of quality just taste preference. I've been to extremely high sushi restaurants that serve miso soup made from white miso, and many that offer a choice.

Finally, it's possible the soup the OP had wasn't miso at all. Many people who aren't that familiar with Japanese cuisine assume all soup served at a sushi restaurant is "miso soup". I hope I'm not insulting anyone by pointing out unless it is cloudy, it doesn't have miso in it and some sushi restaurants serve clear soup (with various things in it) to finish the meal.

There is a restaurant in Santa Clara, CA that serves lobster sashimi. They would take the head and tail and make a miso soup with it.

Likewise if they serve ama-ebi sashimi, the head would be in a soup or deep fried.

One day this particular lobster decided to crawl off the plate. One guest practically jump out of his skin.

I think you may be exhibiting a regional bias with that figure about bonito shavings.

I'm not so sure that only 'upscale' restaurants make dashi from scratch. Saying that, miso soup doesn't exactly showcase a good dashi broth as the taste of the miso will swamp the delicate flavours. So, where miso is added to the broth, and where dashi is used as a cooking condiment, I agree, it is often the case that commercially prepared dashi (as a concentrate or powder) is used.

But it's not always to do with the perceived 'class' of the restaurant. There are many modest establishments that specialise in 'simple' dishes where the success of the food is almost dependent on the dashi making skills of the chef. This seems to be particularly the case with soba and udon. In many of these places, making dashi from scratch is more economically viable than one might expect as the dried fish can be re-used. Dashi made with first infusion tasting different to the subsequent infusion (niban dashi) which will have a different use (miso soup being a prime example).

I'm wary of generalising too much about what people eat in restaurants on this forum. Whilst I wouldn't expect Yoshinoya, Royal Host and Nakau to be making dashi from scratch, the experience of visitors to Japan won't necessarily reflect the reality of what's available. What I mean is that a visitor (certainly a Flyertalk reader) is more likely to be eating dishes made with real dashi than any statistics might suggest by following advice from guidebooks and concierges, acting on recommendations and by conducting their own research on where to eat. Even if it is true about the rarity of 'lower end' establishments making their own dashi, this wouldn't necessarily be the experience of a visitor with a real interest in Japanese food, even those with smaller budgets. It certainly hasn't been mine.

(Sorry about any perceived nit-picking, it's just that your statement could be viewed with unnecessary pessimism by those who can't afford to eat at higher end places)

Oh, no intention to diminish Spanish culinary achivements. Would be very hard to do so with all the acclaim. :) But the Japanese/Italian and Chinese/French comparison I still find rather fitting.

Very interesting to read, cheers. Korean simple soups are not entirely dissimilar.

This is also very interesting. I try to dig up something on this as well.

Well, Chinese home cooking has a variety of "balance" and "digestif" function soups. Like the omnipresent tomato and egg soup, noodles with seaweed but also Sichuanese very mild broths to offset all the fiery other dishes.

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The Sichuanese fish soup I had yesterday was not minimalist for sure. Mmm, moght actually go for seaweed and miso afterwards...

The acclaim is quite recent, I assure you. I don't imagine for a moment you would have felt the same way back in the 1970s or early 80s.

I've no doubt it fits beautifully with your prejudices, oops, perceptions of these diverse and vibrant cuisines.

My opinion is that China is ill served by the France comparison, even taking into account variations in French regional cuisine, it's just too small and narrow to encompass the staggering breadth of what is and has been (pre Cultural Revolution) on offer across China.

With so many techniques and ideas to pillage and plunder, surely the most interesting part when considering similarities in cuisines with the countries surrounding this enormous empire is "why did certain foods get adopted and not others?".

I'm still considering the same questions today with regards to Japan, how did prawn gratin, Napolitan Spaghetti, corn pottage, menchikatsu, beef curry all become popular Japanese foods?

More importantly, when the rest of the world can choose the 'original' version (of the following dishes) why is it that Ramen, Tempura and Tonkatsu are becoming so immensely popular elsewhere? Most bewildering to me is why is anybody eating the British inspired Japanese Curry when there are a surfeit of delicious alternatives?

When looking at the the past one can easily attribute the successful export of certain foods to the influence of religion on the culture, now the reasons aren't nearly so clear cut. And this influence of fashions and trends is muddied further when people make choices in deciding and declaring their preferences as a way of defying the prodding of popular culture. Now that Japanese food has attained a high status in many societies this causes an inevitable backlash against it resulting in a convoluted inverse snobbery in some.

"Upscale" was a misleading and unfortunate choice of words on my part. I'd still adhere to the 99% figure. However, many of the restaurants that make their own dashi might be modest looking establishments that nevertheless take a traditional approach to making their food. This would (likely) include traditional handcrafted soba restaurants. Furthermore, many places with upscale appearances use hondashi.

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Thanks for clarifying your points. On the whole your assertions seem quite sound to me, but I have a Tokyo focus, so I can't dispute or support the claim that 99% of dashi (made from scratch) is made from bonito flakes.

The reason I'm uncomfortable with it is that everything I've read about other areas having a preference for dashi made with niboshi is supported by its availability at Japanese food shops in London. These tend to act as microcosms reflecting the prevailing cooking styles and requirements of people from throughout Japan. Anything too obscure or used too rarely just isn't stocked.

Enough arguin'. Let's eat. Smidgen is hungry.

Does Smidgen like niboshi?
The homeless Japanese cat I was feeding last week didn't seem to be overly keen on the fish I was giving it (some kind of iwashi? came in a pack of 6 with a plastic straw piercing the mouths) and much preferred the stale katsuobushi I found in the larder.

I know very little about cats and would have liked to have been able to log on and ask for advice here. In particular it didn't like the egg pouches of the fish (eventually it would eat the rest), but, in addition to yellowed katsuobushi it did like milk, raw egg, chikuwa and loved tuna so much it swallowed down the tofu/miso/tuna burgers I made.

Its breath didn't smell of cat-food, no cat-food is sold on Shiraishi Island.

I always bring back packets of kezuri-bushi to sprinkle over cat-food. Of course my cats prefer smoked salmon and best prawns from M&S but you have to draw a line somewhere.

The best miso soup I had recently was this crab miso soup in a sushi restaurant near Numazu Harbour.

I don't even know why Pickles lets Smidgen read this thread... ;)

Itadakimasu!

Sanosuke!

Once again I was typing faster than I was thinking. I checked with a fairly definitive source.

Probably 80 - 90% of all [restaurant made] dashi is made with katsuo. There are regional differences as well as within the type of restaurant. Sushi restaurants almost always use katsuo. Traditional soba restaurants tend to use niboshi, iwashi, or other similar fish.

Also, to clarify for those who haven't studied Japanese cooking, dashi isn't only used as a base for soup. Much like other stocks in western cooking, it is used very widely in many different dishes to add flavor, for braising, stewing, etc.

I don't know. I know he loves cheese, but in general he's not a particularly finicky eater. This is a cat who will gladly munch on his crunchies and then lick his privates (or viceversa). Mrs. Pickles' theory is that the crunchies must be butt-flavored.