Jan 18 2007
South Africans Eat Square Sushi
Didja eat anything different?
That’s what people want to know.
I ate square sushi. That was kinda different. Square sushi was pretty much representative of the food I ate in the Cape Town area: a local twist of food I can get back home.
Laverne is a sushi addict. If I weren’t allergic to fish, I might be, too. She has to have it at least once a week. When it comes to the more expensive addictions, sushi ain’t a bad one to have. Healthier and you’ll pass any drug tests.
My first evening in Cape Town and off we go to have sushi for dinner. We go to a neighborhood place, Eastern Fusion.
What were you expecting? Charred antelope roasted over a spit dug into the desert sand, eaten while we fought off the tigers? You might want to read South Africans Eat Ice Cream if you thought that.
The owner, a tall (whaddup with THAT? Asians aren’t supposed to be that tall) slender Japanese woman with long black hair greets Laverne warmly and enthusiastically. Laverne is obviously a favored customer. Laverne looks both pleased and uncomfortable by all the hugging. She’s relieved with it ends.
We crowd around the table: Laverne, Shirley, M, Linda with A on her lap, and myself. Laverne and Shirley barely look at the menu; they already know what they want. Linda and her mother, M select the Chinese dishes (probably where the “Fusion” comes from).
I figure sushi is pretty much sushi the world over, but I should try something different. I see “Sushi Sandwich” on the menu.
I order it. It arrives. It’s square.
It was constructed like a sandwich: layers of rice separated by sheets of dried seaweed and filled with vegetables or fish. Typical sushi ingredients. It didn’t look like a sandwich, though. Unless a sandwich is bread laid flat on a plate. The “bread” was further sliced into squares so you could pop the individual pieces into your mouth.
Still tasted like sushi, though.