November 8, 2007

Sushi anyone?

Who here loves sushi?
*pause*
I can almost hear hundreds of little voices exclaiming "Mee! Me ME!" at the back of my head. ;)

I know more than a handful who worship good sushi chefs and a fair share of my foodies out there who love having a meal of Japanese; be it at a table or at an classic sushi train restaurant with its innovative track-device-'thingie' invented specifically to tempt us to eat more sushi than we should! *laughs*
You got to admit; it's hard to look away when they sneakily run delicious looking morsels of carefully stacked fragrant rice and condiments right below our naive little noses as we dine! It moves to slowly...teasing our vision and senses...making weak ones (such as moi~) succumb to our curiosity and greed! Even when I'm not certain what exactly the plate of food is... if it's pretty and I've seen it go pass twice; I'd eat it~ ..*shakes head in shame* Japanese chefs really do take effort in making visual experiences of eating pure pleasure to diners.
The whole Japanese sushi fad did not exactly kick in till a good 10-15 years back for us in Malaysia. Sushi train restaurants have only began to pop up everywhere in Sydney 3-4 years back. I remember my first Japanese cuisine experience with sis, daddy and mommy. It was at a fancy little Japanese joint somewhere in KL; I don't remember exactly where, but I was young and easily amused. Mom and dad had ordered a kiddy sushi set meal for sis and I...and it came it a little wooden boat!! I was so excited!! Everything was colourful and interestingly arranged all over the wooden tray. I didn't care to ask what it was! I just wanted to eat it!! When I did... I was shocked... it was cold... it tasted like fish.. but I exclaimed: "Ma... I don't think it's cooked"
Dad and mom laughed real hard... and dad said: "I don't think Japanese is for us" *laughs*
Well, that was back in the day when Japanese food was scarce. At recent times; it's hard to get my family of four to agree simultaneously to anything but Japanese cuisine.
I was tempted to make a sushi - 'wooden boat" like I had remembered for the base of this cake; but decided that would definitely be beyond my cake decorating skill level at this point! *laughs*

I came up with this instead.
Mayumi had ordered a cake for her boss at Sushi Suma ( a famous Japanese restaurant in Surry Hills) They make the best sushi+sashimi sets! Her colleagues had all pitched in money to get him a birthday cake as a surprise. Mayumi had initially suggested a "face" like Tamaki had for her boss last week; but I convinced her I could create something cooler than a "face" for her!
What do you reckon?



I liked the concept; but it was hard to maneuver the chopsticks around the salmon sushi piece to make sure the sticks do not stab the food; as us Chinese believe, stabbing food is a bad bad omen. No idea why; need to ask my mom about that one. I got the sticks at the sides of the sushi to look like it was dipping it into the soy sauce bowl just right. Balancing the sticks was another level of "pain" of its own.
I'm happy it finally stood up right... I'm about to send it off to Mayumi in the next 30 minutes. I hope she'll like it... I really do myself. *shrug*
Will update everyone on how it turns out :)

edit: SHE LOVED IT! *proud grin*

15 comments:

Anonymous said...

Stabbing chopsticks on food signifies offering incense/ death.

That was another nice cake, but I wished there were more sushi.

Anonymous said...

This cake is amazing! Can you eat the sushi pieces? are they made from frosting? So creative and beautiful. The balancing of the chopsticks does sound challenging. When you find out from your mom the deal with the piercing of the food w/the sticks, I hope you'll share what she says. junemoon

Anonymous said...

i love the design!! =)

re: chopsticks in rice being a bad omen - i was told that when someone has passed away, at their funeral people would present a bowl of rice with chopsticks poked into the centre of the bowl. i guess that's where the bad connotations associated with chopsticks-in-rice come from....

Jelly said...

Hi! I'm an Italian foodblogger.
Your cakes are very very very beautiful!!!!!
You are an artist!
Bye!:-)

Sarah said...

I've been reading your blog for months and months and months and love all of your designs - but I think this one might be my very favorite! I think it seems like it's on a grander scale than your other cakes. Anyway, it's gorgeous. Congratulations!!

Anonymous said...

Yes Yes I love jap food!! awwhhh.... how i always splurge on those tiny bites!! HAHAH... yea i agree those sushi train makes you eat WAYYYY more than you should too..lol..

Ah... I Hope you can document your experience at Tetsuya with us!!

thanks

Anonymous said...

nice blog :)

Graeme said...

Sugar chopsticks now?

Your cakes are like visual Birthday and Christmas gifts rolled into one.

ps. I can't hack Sushi - Gross. Any seafood for that matter, cooked or otherwise.

Anonymous said...

oh i love it.. :)
too cute !

and i love sushi suma too :P

Anonymous said...

I think this is your best one yet!!!! Keep it up!

~mia

Unknown said...

LOL you're so sweet, getting worried everytime you make a cake for someone...when there's really nothing to worry about! Just shows how much you want your customers to be happy!

Anonymous said...

WOW! I'm amazed. Really!
How can you make all of that cakes? You are incredibly talented!

Anonymous said...

hey, just a question out of curiosity.. do you take orders from anyone or just ppl you noe ?? ps. your cakes are very creative! =)

JY said...

This is so beautiful. You are so telanted! I wish I'm half as good. Do you attend any baking course?

Su-Yin -Décorateur said...

thanks everyone for enlightening me about the stabbing of chopsticks! real lucky i didn't have that on the cake! haha.

a big thhank you for those who left really sweet comments on my cakes. It's so nice to hear from new blog readers!
thanks for all the encouraging words and compliments; i truly appreciate every single one of your kind gestures.

graeme: I CANT BELIEVE YOU DON"T eAT SUSHI! WOW...

jwendee: from everyone my dear :) There is a red sign you can click at the side tab of my blog to find out more about ordering cakes from me :)

jy: Nah.. i've not had courses; I learnt doing this from books and just playing around with things at home