Monday, January 12, 2026 'Unutilized Fish: Threadfin Bream'

It continues to be clear in Tokyo today.
The morning low was -1.5°C, and the daytime high was just under 9°C.
Since last Saturday, we have entered the next term of the 24 solar terms—the Lesser Cold—and the next micro-season of the 72 micro-seasons called 'Shimizu Atatakawofukumu' (the time when water begins to move in frozen springs).
Even though it is the dead of winter, I suppose it means that preparations for spring are steadily progressing in the natural world. Now then,

Last weekend, I wrote about 'Fermented Beverage (Sake) - Garyubai (Sanwa Shuzo)', but today I would like to talk about 'unutilized fish: Threadfin Bream'.

Threadfin Bream. Even if you have heard of
threadfin bream, I suspect not many people know or have eaten threadfin bream. Both threadfin bream and this species belong to one of the three fish in the
Nemipteridae family (the third one is the pale threadfin bream), so they are related and look so similar that in some regions they are sold without being distinguished at all.However, you can clearly distinguish them because the threadfin bream lives in deeper waters (100–300m) than the common threadfin bream, it is slightly stockier (has a higher body depth) when you look closely, and the vertical stripes under its belly are a vivid fluorescent yellow.

In Japan, it is widely distributed on both the Pacific and Sea of Japan sides, and is caught particularly often in western Japan.
However, as mentioned above, because it lives in slightly deeper waters, it is relatively common in areas where deep-sea trawling is popular (though it is often caught as bycatch rather than being targeted), and it almost never appears in central wholesale markets like Toyosu Market, making it more of a local consumption item.
Therefore, while it is utilized in some places, I think it is positioned as an unutilized fish on a national level.
For fishermen, it is not caught in large quantities, so even though it tastes almost the same as threadfin bream, it is a fish that is hard to assign market value to (if you can get it cheaply, it is in a sense a fish to look out for).

As for the taste, it is a refined white fish with a translucent quality and a subtle sweetness, so it is delicious no matter how you prepare it.
The flesh is a bit soft for sashimi, so it is better to prepare it as kombu-jime (cured with kelp) or yubiki (blanched), but it is also great grilled with salt, simmered, deep-fried, or in soups.
The only drawback is that it has many small bones.

So, this time I bought 5 of them, including some small ones, for 500 yen at Isshiki Sakana Mura.
They were sold the morning they were caught, so the freshness was outstanding, yet they were 100 yen each... (lol).
This time I tried eating them as yubiki/kombu-jime, grilled with salt, and simmered, and all were delicious.
The taste was probably almost indistinguishable from threadfin bream; it was a delicious, refined, and sweet white fish.
I think it would also be quite delicious steamed with sake or cooked in the Okinawan 'maasu-ni' style.

So, if you can get your hands on threadfin bream at a low price, I highly recommend you give it a try.

Tomorrow, I would like to talk about 'Ishoku Dogen (Medicine and food share the same origin) - Protein'.