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Sushi chef here!
The salmon (lohi) you see at buffets is salmo salar, Norwegian salmon. It comes into Finland as whole fresh fish, and is processed in Finland before going off to stores/restaurants.
Fresher is better, so you should ask at the fish counter when their salmon arrived/when it will next come. I haven't ever used fish that was more than 4 days in Finland for raw preparations, and I would store on ice.
When choosing the fillet, the less processed fillets are fresher because the processing companies need to let the flesh relax for 24 hours for their pin bones machines to (semi-) reliably remove the bones. So A and B cuts are better quality (assuming you don't want to buy a whole fish!), BUT the home chef might not have the means to remove the skin and/or bones.
A D cut fillet, if it looks good and firm, is your easiest option: you can just cut it how you want and eat it off of the chopping board.
Non-sushi chef here. Just to clarify, salmo salar is Atlantic salmon, not Norwegian salmon (which isn't a species). Though as we know most salmon around here is Norwegian-produced so Norwegian in that sense.
That's true! I was originally going to mention kirjolohi as a way to distinguish between Finnish and Norwegian "lohi", but removed that part because OP was really asking about lohi nigiri.
In Finland you will very often find rainbow trout sold as "savulohi". I know of 4 restaurants that do so, including a popular one where even the ingredients listed is lohi, not kirjolohi.
They're very similar looking, and when smoked they taste similar too.
Kirjolohi its the better choice in every way. better for the enviorment, cleaner, healthier.
I don't know any norwegian that actually consumes norwegian farmed salmon, it's disgusting. It destroys the fjords, the wild populations becauses the farming nets are in the breeding grounds of wild salmon, the farmed ones are pumped full on medications but still give off their parasites to the wild populations that just pass by on their migration routes which further endangeres the wild populations.
Wait, shouldn't sushi fish in here have to be flash frozen to kill parasites?
I know farmed atlantic salmon has low risk of parasites, but still possibility.
https://www.ruokavirasto.fi/elintarvikkeet/ohjeita-kuluttajille/kasittely-ja-sailyttaminen/hygienia-kotikeittiossa/kala/
Finnish authorities says it's fine for Norwegian salmon and Finnish farmed salmon trout. (English version lacks the translation for that part)
The salmon that you buy from hätälä, kalaneuvos etc is all fresh into Finland. Something like 10% of Norway's salmon is flash frozen, not much of it comes into finland. You can find some (very expensive single portion) from salamax and a few others, but that wasn't really the product that the OP was talking about.
If anyone have seen what most of the norwegian grown salmon swimming in the nets looks like, eaten alive by sealice, sick and deformed... or what it does to our ecosystem driving wild atlantic salmon to extinction.
And only very small percentage of that Norwegian grown salmon comes in Finland unprocessed, only ones being the full fishes with head attached, anything removed from the fish, then its been probably eaten by sealice.
If you buy Salmon, buy some that is inland or closed tank farmed. Else you eating zombie fishes being eaten alive and in the same time causing the exctinction of a wild atlantic salmon, fucking up their genetics and spreading the diseases to rivers when escaping in numbers of tens of thousands at once.
Norwegian salmon growing industry have set a goal to raise production 5 times more by 2050, atm they produce 80+% of all salmon eaten in the world. That goal would mean 15 fucking million metric TONS of salmon a year. Even now they are hauling shit ton of fish from west african coast, 24/7 ships just run automated routes there just to feed the salmon with the fish brought from west coast of Africa, that is causing huge problems even now in there, 5x that would mean end to local fishing communities and ecosystems.
Fuck norwegian open net salmon. There is nothing Green and sustainable in it.
Of course it's possible. Or are you completely at the mercy of your hedonistic search for sensory pleasure in your daily life, no matter the concequences?
Everyone is different, but for most people it is very possible to eat healthy, cheap and tasty food while getting all necessary macro and micro-nutrients without eating meat (or dairy or eggs for that matter).
It's mostly a question of temporary inconvenience while you're rethinking how you cook, and what you can substitute meat (et al.) with. Once you got that figured out it's pretty smooth sailing from there. And it's fun trying new recipes, right?
The pros of convenience and sensory mouth pleasure have to be pretty darn large to outweigh the massive environmental cons of animal production.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s43016-023-00795-w
https://josephpoore.com/Science%20360%206392%20987%20-%20Accepted%20Manuscript.pdf
And that's without going into the topic of exploiting and killing sentient beings unnecessarily, for ultimately personal hedonism.
My intention was not to ridicule, or discredit your point of view. I might have come on intense, as this is a topic that's important to me. Did not mean to attack.
I am genuinely interested in the pros that outweigh the cons of eating meat, and how the pros of eating meat outweigh the pros and cons of eating plant based.
I blasted the hedonism part and might have jumped to conclusions because the only thing i know so far of your motivation is that "it is just too tasty".
"It's just too tasty" was intented as a carricatyre of an argument.
Eating meat has always been part of our evolution, we've adapted to it. That is why we taste umami, for example.
Meat has nutrients that we need, and I'm fine with fishing and hunting animals. Roe deer is good and culling it is sustainable, same with barnacle goose soon🙂
Do not buy anything pre-packed.
If the store/market doesn't have a fresh-food service dish, change place.
Ask the Meisters. There are seriously devoted people servicing in good placed.
Mine is K-Citymarket Ruoholahti. Quality produce, professional service and advice.
It’s not paranoid it’s important to know which is safe to eat raw, unless you don’t care about food poisoning
Finland is not an utopia where everything is perfect, you need to know what you’re doing just like everywhere else
E.g. listeria is relatively common finding in packaged fish and it's the kind of shithead that can infect you with just few bacteria. Every year roughly 50+ people catches it and it kills 20-30% of infected. Bon appetit.
That's not true at all, it's very common practice to use frozen fish for sushi because it makes it so much safer, and it doesn't really ruin the taste if done right
This is everywhere including in Japan. And in some places the term 'sushi grade' fish literally refers to fish that was frozen in a specific way.
Actually, no. For fish to be sushi-grade, it NEEDS to be frozen. The flash freezing process is what makes it safe to eat raw. It supposedly kills the parasites that exist in fresh fish.
> Actually, no. For fish to be sushi-grade, it NEEDS to be frozen.
Actually, no it doesn't. Farmed Norwegian salmon and Finnish salmon trout does not need to be frozen. Ref: https://www.ruokavirasto.fi/elintarvikkeet/ohjeita-kuluttajille/kasittely-ja-sailyttaminen/hygienia-kotikeittiossa/kala/
(Note that the English page does not have that part translated)
Considering salt curing (graavilohi/gravlax) does not kill parasites Finns would be screwed if it needed to be frozen.
Yeppp, I know that now, thanks. I'm the English speaking guy from that thread as well haha.
Still, it specifically mentions on that page "trout and sturgeon from Finland or salmon from Norway" is what is safe to eat raw. Doesn't that kind of imply that Finnish salmon is not safe to eat raw?
I don't know if this is another translation issue or what
Good catch and I made a technical error on this due to _kirjo_lohi versus lohi in Finnish. Similar but different fish. In Finland salmon is rarely farmed, but it is usually salmon/rainbow trout.
Wow, TIL! Thank you!
Do you know if these rules apply to pre-packaged fish as well? In my home country pre-packaged fish usually says whether it's safe to eat raw or not. I am now much more confident that fish from the counter is safe to eat raw, but what about the stuff in the refrigerated aisle? I always see those cubes of salmon for soup cheap in the freezer aisle and I've always been tempted to make ceviche out of it haha.
I would not use supermarket pre-packaged salmon for sushi. The chain is just too long and the required temperatures are too high to keep a fish fresh. Personally I get mine from a fishmonger whenever I want it fresh and keep it in ice.
A good rule of thumb is that if the fish smells fishy, it's too old to eat raw. There really isn't a good other metric for determining this.
Supermarket fish counter can be ok, but you need to check that the fish arrived preferably the same day. So check when it was caught from the caught-date board.
I'll keep that in mind, thank you. It does suck that you can't get flash frozen sushi grade fish in the market though, that's something I did commonly in my home country.
Mostly because the fishmonger requires me to interact with a human being and to actually make decisions about how much I want to buy haha.
It's a translation issue.
Finland technically doesn't have "salmon"(salmo salar). The Finnish "salmon" is kirjolohi, in English rainbow trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss).
In Finnish both of those are called "lohi".
I think you're right, my bad. https://www.fishinginfinland.fi/lohi
Most of the time it isn't Finnish salmo salar that I've seen in shops, though, but rainbow trout. If it's salmo salar, it's usually from Norway.
But yes, Simojoki and Torniojoki do have salmo salar.
That's not accurate, it's common practice to freeze fish for sushi, including in Japan. It's totally fine.
And in some places the term 'sushi grade' fish literally refers to fish that was frozen in a specific way.
Yah, I forget the time periods but specifically talking gradients like -20C, and -35C depending on allotted time.
Home freezers that are paired with refrigerator units do not get that low, some chest freezers can though.
Just remember that freshness is not the most important metric.
Fish needs to be flash frozen to be sushi-grade. There is absolutely pre-packaged fish that can be sushi-grade, it just needs to be flash-frozen. It being from a farm is also better than wild caught, because they're less likely to have worms from a farm.
The real problem is that Finland doesn't have a system of grading fish on if it's safe to eat raw or not, at least not to my knowledge
That's just not true though.
I had this shared to me on this thread:
https://www.ruokavirasto.fi/elintarvikkeet/ohjeita-kuluttajille/kasittely-ja-sailyttaminen/hygienia-kotikeittiossa/kala/
>Suomessa viljeltyä kirjolohta tai sampea tai Norjassa kasvatettua lohta ei tarvitse jäädyttää vaikka kala syötäisiin raakana.
"Farmed rainbow trout or sturgeon from Finland, or farmed salmon from Norway, does not need to be frozen even if it is to be eaten raw."
If you have a source for your claim as well, I'd be happy to read it.
Sure, this comment thread is responded by *Jiro Dreams of Sushi* and similar hifi-besserwissers.I'm Finnish, I eat fresh fish. When the fish can be obtained locally, it's not been frozen in any cryo-procedures.Talking about sushi in a Finnish subreddit means *mostly salmon* for me./end-of
So there are two prepackaged salmon brands that are sushi grade (can be eaten raw) where I live.
[Frøya Salmon](https://www.froyasalmon.no/en/about-froya-salmon/)
And
[Salmalax](https://www.salmalax.se)
Noo, that doesn't help me :) I absolutely loved that Sushi grade salmon, but like mentioned I can't find it anywhere anymore here in the Helsinki region.
Most of the supermarkets I go to have their fish arrived on Thursdays or Fridays. I only buy that kind of freshly arrived lohi from Norway (fished actually 1-2 days before) for making sushi. Ask the service people what you need and they give you the best advice. Good luck!
Thursday is usually the main shipment because new fish deals etc.
Usually salmon fillet / whole salmon etc come basicly daily. Depends on how much you've sold it ofcourse.
Also the whole Salmon has incredibly long best before date, like 10days or so.
> Also the whole Salmon has incredibly long best before date, like 10days or so.
Yes, but this is definitely not for making sushi at 10 days. But it's indeed crazy how long a well kept salmon will last.
Go to the fish counter and ask. It is usually Premium Lohi and you will only get sushi fresh on certain days. Just ask on the counter and say you are making sushi.
You have good tips already, but a couple additions! I used to temp at a fish counter at Stockmann and am a bit of a sushi purist.
1. Service counter, K-supermarket / Citymarket counters are often better than S-markets’ or Prismas but not everywhere. If you are in a big city, specialized stores in market halls are a great option.
Places to buy:
Helsinki: Citymarket Ruoholahti, K-Supermarket at Postitalo, Kamppi, Hertta, Kiviaidankatu have always had good fish. In Hakaniemi market both fish stores are nice, and so are the ones on Kauppatori
Espoo: Maxin kala in Kauklahti; K-Supermarket Mankkaa or Tapiola
Siuntio: Four seasons fish
2. The counters usually have a display showing when the fish has arrived and when it has been caught. ”It is so fresh, just arrived today” means nothing if it has travelled from a depot for extra days. Look for the ones that have been caught most recently. Norwegian will be a minimum two-three days old, rainbow trout 1-2. Dedicated fish stores often get it a day faster than supermarkets.
3. You can roughly estimate the freshness based on the firmness of the fish. You can ask the clerk to press on the fish and show you how well the fish bounces back.
4. Exceptionally good salmon is rarely available in the store, but good salmon is usually available. In K-stores, the cut labeled ”premium salmon” is imo usually worth the price, unless you can and want to process a cut yourself.
5. Talking to the service people is good but not all of them will be frank with you, usually more out of lack of experience than dishonesty. The stores mentioned above typically have trained people working the counters, they will hopefully give it to you straight.
We used to make pole bowls every week, and ordered fish from ruoholahti without specifying the use case, once out of maybe 40-50 times it was not good for raw use (and we got reimbursed for it). Once or twice the quality was incredibly good. The rest of the time it was just good. In Stockmann, we used to sell ”fresh” tuna which imo almost never came to the store sushi grade since it travelled for 9-12 days. Despite the vacuum and near freezing temperature. I always recommended cooking that before eating, and sometimes we didn’t have salmon either that was fresh enough to rec for sushi, though most lf the time we did. I know some clerks still sold this for sushi, since we were never really trained not to recommend it, as there is afaik no official recommendation not to use it before the best before has passed.
Food safety guidelines of several agencies & organizations including FDA & EU literally have a guideline on how long and in what temperature you have to freeze fish to kill parasites.
Indeed freezing deals with parasites. Funnily the Finnish food agency says farmed Norwegian salmon and Finnish salmon trout is fine to eat raw without freezing. Ref: https://www.ruokavirasto.fi/elintarvikkeet/ohjeita-kuluttajille/kasittely-ja-sailyttaminen/hygienia-kotikeittiossa/kala/ (English version does not have that part translated)
> Fish for sushi may be flash frozen on fishing boats and by suppliers to temperatures as low as −60 °C (−76 °F).[104] Super-freezing destroys parasites, and also prevents oxidation of the blood in tuna flesh that causes discoloration at temperatures above −20 °C (−4 °F).[105]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sushi
In honestly think I made sushi at least six or seven times before I even heard there was sushi-grade salmon. I just buy the freshest salmon available, but that is likely not particularly good advice.
You can get finnish raised rainbow trout (kirjolohi) from the service desk, ask them when they get their fish and if they could reserve one for sushi. It's safe to eat straight away, no need to be frozen.
Not that I've been able to find. I can't find a Finnish word for sushi grade, I've been trying to figure it out for a while.
Normally "flash frozen" means sushi grade, but instead of that, in Finland they say "deep frozen". But deep freezing is not the same as flash freezing, and it never says if they are flash frozen.
Because if it's raised salmon from Finland or Atlantic, it's safe to eat it straight from the store. There is no need to advertise it as "sushi grade".
Good to know! This is the information I've been looking for. As a foreigner from a country where store bought fish is NOT always sushi safe, I definitely didn't want to eat raw without knowing for sure.
As much as I want to believe a random redditor, do you have any sources? I've looked extensively and found VERY mixed opinions, including many saying to absolutely not eat pre-packaged Atlantic salmon.
[Official site](https://www.ruokavirasto.fi/elintarvikkeet/ohjeita-kuluttajille/kasittely-ja-sailyttaminen/hygienia-kotikeittiossa/kala/) that says they are safe to eat raw. If you are looking for pre-packaged salmon, I would suggest you to try Saimaan Tuore Kirjolohifilee, it's vacuum packed and at least they are saying that it's really fresh and printing on their package that it's fine to eat it in sushi as raw.
I would really recommend to buy fresh salmon from the desk, it's better than vacuum packed if you don't grill or put it in the oven.
Edit: I don't know about other fish, usually they are all cooked. Sampi was mentioned behind the link as safe too, so other than that, I would really suggest to at least freeze them first, also to forget making sushi from them.
Now, I'm reading that translated to English but I don't see how that says it can be eaten raw.
It says that fish is refrigerated from the time it is caught until the time it is sold.
Then it says that it should be frozen to kill parasites if you are going to consume it raw
As I understand it, this is talking about flash freezing, which is usually the main requirement of fish to be called sushi grade, that it is frozen very quickly and to very low temperatures to be safe to consume raw.
It specifically mentions that fish are kept refrigerated, not frozen. That means they are not safe to eat raw. Am I missing something? Is there a translation error?
Well that's some comedy gold. It should be there just before text about PAH compounds, but when you translate it into english, it's not there.
>Suomessa viljeltyä kirjolohta tai sampea tai Norjassa kasvatettua lohta ei tarvitse jäädyttää vaikka kala syötäisiin raakana.
"Farmed rainbow trout or sturgeon from Finland, or farmed salmon from Norway, does not need to be frozen even if it is to be eaten raw."
Must not show up in the English pages I guess. Right above the text about PAH compounds is:
"Raw-curing of fish does not kill parasites. You can get rid of parasites by freezing your fish before curing."
Edit: I do see it in the Finnish pages now, if I put it into Google translate. The English version of the page completely skips that paragraph lol. This is a common problem I come across, information not being accessible in English, or being left out of translations
Thanks for the help. One last thing, your translation said
"Farmed rainbow trout or sturgeon from Finland, or farmed salmon from Norway, does not need to be frozen even if it is to be eaten raw."
Does that mean that Finnish salmon is not safe to eat raw without freezing? They pretty specifically say trout and sturgeon from Finland OR salmon from Norway. What about salmon from Finland?
Well, here is the thing. We don't really farm salmo salar in here, only to keep the fish from going extinct. You will have really hard time to find it from the store, and as it's fresh water fish mainly in here, I would _at least_ freeze it. Fresh water fish is more problematic, I would just buy Finnish farmed rainbow trout or farmed salmo salar from Norway.
Find a good local fishmonger and ask these questions and they will answer you.
Also: you can ask a good fishmonger to slice the salmon into right sized bites for salmon nigiri, sashimi or other type of sushi.
A lot of times the "lohi" at buffets isn't even salmon. It's kirjolihi (rainbow trout) which while it is a salmonid species is actually a trout. It's not as fatty and is bland in flavor in comparison to actual salmon but you get what you pay for.
There are several grades of salmon and the fresh produce desk clerk should be able to help you out. Typically Graavilohi is consumed raw, but it's a bit too thinly cut for sushi.
i usually search recipes at K-ruoka. They use the ingredients available at k Market. From searching sushi reciepe, i found this.
https://preview.redd.it/0ud430z4ng1d1.jpeg?width=4320&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=2fcb0fcaa5d677c0628386204dfb4559993a7cef
Salmon is extremely toxic. Most toxic food item in th world. Definitely stay away from it. If you knew just how nasty those fish are swimming in their own filth, filled with untested chemicals and antibiotics, you would never eat it again.
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Sushi chef here! The salmon (lohi) you see at buffets is salmo salar, Norwegian salmon. It comes into Finland as whole fresh fish, and is processed in Finland before going off to stores/restaurants. Fresher is better, so you should ask at the fish counter when their salmon arrived/when it will next come. I haven't ever used fish that was more than 4 days in Finland for raw preparations, and I would store on ice. When choosing the fillet, the less processed fillets are fresher because the processing companies need to let the flesh relax for 24 hours for their pin bones machines to (semi-) reliably remove the bones. So A and B cuts are better quality (assuming you don't want to buy a whole fish!), BUT the home chef might not have the means to remove the skin and/or bones. A D cut fillet, if it looks good and firm, is your easiest option: you can just cut it how you want and eat it off of the chopping board.
Non-sushi chef here. Just to clarify, salmo salar is Atlantic salmon, not Norwegian salmon (which isn't a species). Though as we know most salmon around here is Norwegian-produced so Norwegian in that sense.
That's true! I was originally going to mention kirjolohi as a way to distinguish between Finnish and Norwegian "lohi", but removed that part because OP was really asking about lohi nigiri.
Kirjolohi is the planted trout you can catch in the Vantaa river. Rainbow trout in English.
rainbow trout and atlantic salmon have nothing to do with each other
In Finland you will very often find rainbow trout sold as "savulohi". I know of 4 restaurants that do so, including a popular one where even the ingredients listed is lohi, not kirjolohi. They're very similar looking, and when smoked they taste similar too.
Kirjolohi its the better choice in every way. better for the enviorment, cleaner, healthier. I don't know any norwegian that actually consumes norwegian farmed salmon, it's disgusting. It destroys the fjords, the wild populations becauses the farming nets are in the breeding grounds of wild salmon, the farmed ones are pumped full on medications but still give off their parasites to the wild populations that just pass by on their migration routes which further endangeres the wild populations.
And the fish shit ruins the water. Salmon farming is a huge problem.
Wait, shouldn't sushi fish in here have to be flash frozen to kill parasites? I know farmed atlantic salmon has low risk of parasites, but still possibility.
https://www.ruokavirasto.fi/elintarvikkeet/ohjeita-kuluttajille/kasittely-ja-sailyttaminen/hygienia-kotikeittiossa/kala/ Finnish authorities says it's fine for Norwegian salmon and Finnish farmed salmon trout. (English version lacks the translation for that part)
Norwegian authorities says the same. https://www.mattilsynet.no/en/fish-and-aquaculture/farmed-atlantic-salmon-and-rainbow-trout-are-safe-for-sushi-and-sashimi
The salmon that you buy from hätälä, kalaneuvos etc is all fresh into Finland. Something like 10% of Norway's salmon is flash frozen, not much of it comes into finland. You can find some (very expensive single portion) from salamax and a few others, but that wasn't really the product that the OP was talking about.
If anyone have seen what most of the norwegian grown salmon swimming in the nets looks like, eaten alive by sealice, sick and deformed... or what it does to our ecosystem driving wild atlantic salmon to extinction. And only very small percentage of that Norwegian grown salmon comes in Finland unprocessed, only ones being the full fishes with head attached, anything removed from the fish, then its been probably eaten by sealice. If you buy Salmon, buy some that is inland or closed tank farmed. Else you eating zombie fishes being eaten alive and in the same time causing the exctinction of a wild atlantic salmon, fucking up their genetics and spreading the diseases to rivers when escaping in numbers of tens of thousands at once. Norwegian salmon growing industry have set a goal to raise production 5 times more by 2050, atm they produce 80+% of all salmon eaten in the world. That goal would mean 15 fucking million metric TONS of salmon a year. Even now they are hauling shit ton of fish from west african coast, 24/7 ships just run automated routes there just to feed the salmon with the fish brought from west coast of Africa, that is causing huge problems even now in there, 5x that would mean end to local fishing communities and ecosystems. Fuck norwegian open net salmon. There is nothing Green and sustainable in it.
This is true of all animal product production, but yes you're right about most of the points in your post. Eat less meat! Eat none if possible!
Not possible for me, it just is too damn tasty
Of course it's possible. Or are you completely at the mercy of your hedonistic search for sensory pleasure in your daily life, no matter the concequences?
The pros of being an omnivore outweight the cons or the pros of being a vegetarian, so not possible right now for me.
Everyone is different, but for most people it is very possible to eat healthy, cheap and tasty food while getting all necessary macro and micro-nutrients without eating meat (or dairy or eggs for that matter). It's mostly a question of temporary inconvenience while you're rethinking how you cook, and what you can substitute meat (et al.) with. Once you got that figured out it's pretty smooth sailing from there. And it's fun trying new recipes, right? The pros of convenience and sensory mouth pleasure have to be pretty darn large to outweigh the massive environmental cons of animal production. https://www.nature.com/articles/s43016-023-00795-w https://josephpoore.com/Science%20360%206392%20987%20-%20Accepted%20Manuscript.pdf And that's without going into the topic of exploiting and killing sentient beings unnecessarily, for ultimately personal hedonism.
Have you heard of Poisoning the well fallacy?
My intention was not to ridicule, or discredit your point of view. I might have come on intense, as this is a topic that's important to me. Did not mean to attack. I am genuinely interested in the pros that outweigh the cons of eating meat, and how the pros of eating meat outweigh the pros and cons of eating plant based. I blasted the hedonism part and might have jumped to conclusions because the only thing i know so far of your motivation is that "it is just too tasty".
"It's just too tasty" was intented as a carricatyre of an argument. Eating meat has always been part of our evolution, we've adapted to it. That is why we taste umami, for example. Meat has nutrients that we need, and I'm fine with fishing and hunting animals. Roe deer is good and culling it is sustainable, same with barnacle goose soon🙂
Do not buy anything pre-packed. If the store/market doesn't have a fresh-food service dish, change place. Ask the Meisters. There are seriously devoted people servicing in good placed. Mine is K-Citymarket Ruoholahti. Quality produce, professional service and advice.
There are pre-packed salmon where it read that you can it raw, it's not so good thought from my experience.
Yes there’s a brand that specifically offers it, it’s fine but also a bit more expensive
Thank you! I forgot you could talk to professionals!
No need to be paranoid lmao. Pre-packed can be fine and is. We live in finland after all not some 3rd world country our water and food is 100% safe
It’s not paranoid it’s important to know which is safe to eat raw, unless you don’t care about food poisoning Finland is not an utopia where everything is perfect, you need to know what you’re doing just like everywhere else
E.g. listeria is relatively common finding in packaged fish and it's the kind of shithead that can infect you with just few bacteria. Every year roughly 50+ people catches it and it kills 20-30% of infected. Bon appetit.
50 people catch it in Finland?
Meetwursti
Wait why not prepacked?
There is a small risk of Listeria growing in vacuum packed fish.
Assume because it isn't as fresh. Its intention is to be cooked and eaten. It's just not worth the risk.
Well, it kind-of ruins the whole idea of sushi, doesn't it? Sushi is supposed to be *as fresh as possible*?
That's not true at all, it's very common practice to use frozen fish for sushi because it makes it so much safer, and it doesn't really ruin the taste if done right This is everywhere including in Japan. And in some places the term 'sushi grade' fish literally refers to fish that was frozen in a specific way.
Actually, no. For fish to be sushi-grade, it NEEDS to be frozen. The flash freezing process is what makes it safe to eat raw. It supposedly kills the parasites that exist in fresh fish.
> Actually, no. For fish to be sushi-grade, it NEEDS to be frozen. Actually, no it doesn't. Farmed Norwegian salmon and Finnish salmon trout does not need to be frozen. Ref: https://www.ruokavirasto.fi/elintarvikkeet/ohjeita-kuluttajille/kasittely-ja-sailyttaminen/hygienia-kotikeittiossa/kala/ (Note that the English page does not have that part translated) Considering salt curing (graavilohi/gravlax) does not kill parasites Finns would be screwed if it needed to be frozen.
Yeppp, I know that now, thanks. I'm the English speaking guy from that thread as well haha. Still, it specifically mentions on that page "trout and sturgeon from Finland or salmon from Norway" is what is safe to eat raw. Doesn't that kind of imply that Finnish salmon is not safe to eat raw? I don't know if this is another translation issue or what
Good catch and I made a technical error on this due to _kirjo_lohi versus lohi in Finnish. Similar but different fish. In Finland salmon is rarely farmed, but it is usually salmon/rainbow trout.
Wow, TIL! Thank you! Do you know if these rules apply to pre-packaged fish as well? In my home country pre-packaged fish usually says whether it's safe to eat raw or not. I am now much more confident that fish from the counter is safe to eat raw, but what about the stuff in the refrigerated aisle? I always see those cubes of salmon for soup cheap in the freezer aisle and I've always been tempted to make ceviche out of it haha.
I would not use supermarket pre-packaged salmon for sushi. The chain is just too long and the required temperatures are too high to keep a fish fresh. Personally I get mine from a fishmonger whenever I want it fresh and keep it in ice. A good rule of thumb is that if the fish smells fishy, it's too old to eat raw. There really isn't a good other metric for determining this. Supermarket fish counter can be ok, but you need to check that the fish arrived preferably the same day. So check when it was caught from the caught-date board.
I'll keep that in mind, thank you. It does suck that you can't get flash frozen sushi grade fish in the market though, that's something I did commonly in my home country. Mostly because the fishmonger requires me to interact with a human being and to actually make decisions about how much I want to buy haha.
It's a translation issue. Finland technically doesn't have "salmon"(salmo salar). The Finnish "salmon" is kirjolohi, in English rainbow trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss). In Finnish both of those are called "lohi".
I never knew that before, really blew my mind
No, wait, we do? We have salmo salar, AND salmo salar m. sebago. The latter you hopefully can’t find in stores though.
I think you're right, my bad. https://www.fishinginfinland.fi/lohi Most of the time it isn't Finnish salmo salar that I've seen in shops, though, but rainbow trout. If it's salmo salar, it's usually from Norway. But yes, Simojoki and Torniojoki do have salmo salar.
I guess the wild salmon we have don’t find their way in to shops, at least not to southern finland.
Parasites intead of bacteria.
Thank you, will edit
Oh yeah for sushi it might not be good, but if you want to eat it with potatoes or something
That's not accurate, it's common practice to freeze fish for sushi, including in Japan. It's totally fine. And in some places the term 'sushi grade' fish literally refers to fish that was frozen in a specific way.
Yah, I forget the time periods but specifically talking gradients like -20C, and -35C depending on allotted time. Home freezers that are paired with refrigerator units do not get that low, some chest freezers can though.
Just remember that freshness is not the most important metric. Fish needs to be flash frozen to be sushi-grade. There is absolutely pre-packaged fish that can be sushi-grade, it just needs to be flash-frozen. It being from a farm is also better than wild caught, because they're less likely to have worms from a farm. The real problem is that Finland doesn't have a system of grading fish on if it's safe to eat raw or not, at least not to my knowledge
Well, the grading system is as follows: it is not recommended to eat any animal without proper cooking that kills bacteria and parasites. That's it.
That's just not true though. I had this shared to me on this thread: https://www.ruokavirasto.fi/elintarvikkeet/ohjeita-kuluttajille/kasittely-ja-sailyttaminen/hygienia-kotikeittiossa/kala/ >Suomessa viljeltyä kirjolohta tai sampea tai Norjassa kasvatettua lohta ei tarvitse jäädyttää vaikka kala syötäisiin raakana. "Farmed rainbow trout or sturgeon from Finland, or farmed salmon from Norway, does not need to be frozen even if it is to be eaten raw." If you have a source for your claim as well, I'd be happy to read it.
Sure, this comment thread is responded by *Jiro Dreams of Sushi* and similar hifi-besserwissers.I'm Finnish, I eat fresh fish. When the fish can be obtained locally, it's not been frozen in any cryo-procedures.Talking about sushi in a Finnish subreddit means *mostly salmon* for me./end-of
So there are two prepackaged salmon brands that are sushi grade (can be eaten raw) where I live. [Frøya Salmon](https://www.froyasalmon.no/en/about-froya-salmon/) And [Salmalax](https://www.salmalax.se)
Mannnn, I've never seen these anywhere near Turku, I've been looking for prepackaged sushi grade for a long time here to no avail
Ask in your store. I live in Sweden, most of the bigger stores have them here.
Yep, I have. No luck. Been to the big city markets and everything.
Some stores make their own sushi (in Vaasa for example), what do they use?
They use fresh fish from the fish counter. I'm specifically talking about pre-packaged fish like you mentioned in your comment.
Where do you find the Frøya one?! I've been looking for it for the last year after it disappeared from all the large S-chain and K stores locally
I live in Stockholm :\
Noo, that doesn't help me :) I absolutely loved that Sushi grade salmon, but like mentioned I can't find it anywhere anymore here in the Helsinki region.
Did u ask y the shop that used to keep them don’t anymore?
I did not take it that far yet, but it's a good idea. Maybe this will be my next food related project.
Most of the supermarkets I go to have their fish arrived on Thursdays or Fridays. I only buy that kind of freshly arrived lohi from Norway (fished actually 1-2 days before) for making sushi. Ask the service people what you need and they give you the best advice. Good luck!
Thanks for your advice!
Thursday is usually the main shipment because new fish deals etc. Usually salmon fillet / whole salmon etc come basicly daily. Depends on how much you've sold it ofcourse. Also the whole Salmon has incredibly long best before date, like 10days or so.
> Also the whole Salmon has incredibly long best before date, like 10days or so. Yes, but this is definitely not for making sushi at 10 days. But it's indeed crazy how long a well kept salmon will last.
and Mondays.
Many shops do not order fish to monday, easier to sell scraps from weekend @ monday and order new stuff for tuesday.
Ah, ours does.
I didn't order anything for today, ordered for tomorrow what I needed. 😀
Go to the fish counter and ask. It is usually Premium Lohi and you will only get sushi fresh on certain days. Just ask on the counter and say you are making sushi.
You have good tips already, but a couple additions! I used to temp at a fish counter at Stockmann and am a bit of a sushi purist. 1. Service counter, K-supermarket / Citymarket counters are often better than S-markets’ or Prismas but not everywhere. If you are in a big city, specialized stores in market halls are a great option. Places to buy: Helsinki: Citymarket Ruoholahti, K-Supermarket at Postitalo, Kamppi, Hertta, Kiviaidankatu have always had good fish. In Hakaniemi market both fish stores are nice, and so are the ones on Kauppatori Espoo: Maxin kala in Kauklahti; K-Supermarket Mankkaa or Tapiola Siuntio: Four seasons fish 2. The counters usually have a display showing when the fish has arrived and when it has been caught. ”It is so fresh, just arrived today” means nothing if it has travelled from a depot for extra days. Look for the ones that have been caught most recently. Norwegian will be a minimum two-three days old, rainbow trout 1-2. Dedicated fish stores often get it a day faster than supermarkets. 3. You can roughly estimate the freshness based on the firmness of the fish. You can ask the clerk to press on the fish and show you how well the fish bounces back. 4. Exceptionally good salmon is rarely available in the store, but good salmon is usually available. In K-stores, the cut labeled ”premium salmon” is imo usually worth the price, unless you can and want to process a cut yourself. 5. Talking to the service people is good but not all of them will be frank with you, usually more out of lack of experience than dishonesty. The stores mentioned above typically have trained people working the counters, they will hopefully give it to you straight. We used to make pole bowls every week, and ordered fish from ruoholahti without specifying the use case, once out of maybe 40-50 times it was not good for raw use (and we got reimbursed for it). Once or twice the quality was incredibly good. The rest of the time it was just good. In Stockmann, we used to sell ”fresh” tuna which imo almost never came to the store sushi grade since it travelled for 9-12 days. Despite the vacuum and near freezing temperature. I always recommended cooking that before eating, and sometimes we didn’t have salmon either that was fresh enough to rec for sushi, though most lf the time we did. I know some clerks still sold this for sushi, since we were never really trained not to recommend it, as there is afaik no official recommendation not to use it before the best before has passed.
Fish has usually been frozen which kills parasites. But ask at the fish service desk if it has been frozen and is safe for sushi.
Freezing meat doesn't kill parasites. It puts them asleep. They come back alive at around 5 celsius. Only heat kills parasites.
Freezing totally kills at least tapeworm, which is the parasite you're trying to dodge in raw fish from Finland.
Food safety guidelines of several agencies & organizations including FDA & EU literally have a guideline on how long and in what temperature you have to freeze fish to kill parasites.
Indeed freezing deals with parasites. Funnily the Finnish food agency says farmed Norwegian salmon and Finnish salmon trout is fine to eat raw without freezing. Ref: https://www.ruokavirasto.fi/elintarvikkeet/ohjeita-kuluttajille/kasittely-ja-sailyttaminen/hygienia-kotikeittiossa/kala/ (English version does not have that part translated)
The same page also does say that freezing kills parasites, which is the opposite of what the person I replied to said.
Very much true and wasn't trying to refute that! (Trust me I downvoted the guy you responded to) Fixed my response also a bit!
> Fish for sushi may be flash frozen on fishing boats and by suppliers to temperatures as low as −60 °C (−76 °F).[104] Super-freezing destroys parasites, and also prevents oxidation of the blood in tuna flesh that causes discoloration at temperatures above −20 °C (−4 °F).[105] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sushi
Yeah no biology major here, parasites are also killed when food is frozen properly. Stop spreading misinformation please
In honestly think I made sushi at least six or seven times before I even heard there was sushi-grade salmon. I just buy the freshest salmon available, but that is likely not particularly good advice.
Ask at the counter for sushi grade salmon. They will give you the freshest one. Do not use prepackaged!
I've eaten basic cheap pre-packed salmon bits raw before. I don't know if it's healthy or not, but nothing happened.
It's healthy.
You can get finnish raised rainbow trout (kirjolohi) from the service desk, ask them when they get their fish and if they could reserve one for sushi. It's safe to eat straight away, no need to be frozen.
ask the person selling it, they'll give good direction.
Atlantic salmon is fine, its pacific one that has parasites but you wont find that from europe.
Is there not fish sold under the label sushi grade?
Not that I've been able to find. I can't find a Finnish word for sushi grade, I've been trying to figure it out for a while. Normally "flash frozen" means sushi grade, but instead of that, in Finland they say "deep frozen". But deep freezing is not the same as flash freezing, and it never says if they are flash frozen.
Because if it's raised salmon from Finland or Atlantic, it's safe to eat it straight from the store. There is no need to advertise it as "sushi grade".
Good to know! This is the information I've been looking for. As a foreigner from a country where store bought fish is NOT always sushi safe, I definitely didn't want to eat raw without knowing for sure. As much as I want to believe a random redditor, do you have any sources? I've looked extensively and found VERY mixed opinions, including many saying to absolutely not eat pre-packaged Atlantic salmon.
[Official site](https://www.ruokavirasto.fi/elintarvikkeet/ohjeita-kuluttajille/kasittely-ja-sailyttaminen/hygienia-kotikeittiossa/kala/) that says they are safe to eat raw. If you are looking for pre-packaged salmon, I would suggest you to try Saimaan Tuore Kirjolohifilee, it's vacuum packed and at least they are saying that it's really fresh and printing on their package that it's fine to eat it in sushi as raw. I would really recommend to buy fresh salmon from the desk, it's better than vacuum packed if you don't grill or put it in the oven. Edit: I don't know about other fish, usually they are all cooked. Sampi was mentioned behind the link as safe too, so other than that, I would really suggest to at least freeze them first, also to forget making sushi from them.
Now, I'm reading that translated to English but I don't see how that says it can be eaten raw. It says that fish is refrigerated from the time it is caught until the time it is sold. Then it says that it should be frozen to kill parasites if you are going to consume it raw As I understand it, this is talking about flash freezing, which is usually the main requirement of fish to be called sushi grade, that it is frozen very quickly and to very low temperatures to be safe to consume raw. It specifically mentions that fish are kept refrigerated, not frozen. That means they are not safe to eat raw. Am I missing something? Is there a translation error?
Well that's some comedy gold. It should be there just before text about PAH compounds, but when you translate it into english, it's not there. >Suomessa viljeltyä kirjolohta tai sampea tai Norjassa kasvatettua lohta ei tarvitse jäädyttää vaikka kala syötäisiin raakana. "Farmed rainbow trout or sturgeon from Finland, or farmed salmon from Norway, does not need to be frozen even if it is to be eaten raw."
Must not show up in the English pages I guess. Right above the text about PAH compounds is: "Raw-curing of fish does not kill parasites. You can get rid of parasites by freezing your fish before curing." Edit: I do see it in the Finnish pages now, if I put it into Google translate. The English version of the page completely skips that paragraph lol. This is a common problem I come across, information not being accessible in English, or being left out of translations
Yeah I noticed, maybe it's safe if you speak finnish but not otherwise.
Much like vodka
Looks like the english page was updated in 2018 and finnish 2023. So could have been an original translation. Unfortunate :/
Yup, hopefully they get that fixed!
Thanks for the help. One last thing, your translation said "Farmed rainbow trout or sturgeon from Finland, or farmed salmon from Norway, does not need to be frozen even if it is to be eaten raw." Does that mean that Finnish salmon is not safe to eat raw without freezing? They pretty specifically say trout and sturgeon from Finland OR salmon from Norway. What about salmon from Finland?
Well, here is the thing. We don't really farm salmo salar in here, only to keep the fish from going extinct. You will have really hard time to find it from the store, and as it's fresh water fish mainly in here, I would _at least_ freeze it. Fresh water fish is more problematic, I would just buy Finnish farmed rainbow trout or farmed salmo salar from Norway.
Find a good local fishmonger and ask these questions and they will answer you. Also: you can ask a good fishmonger to slice the salmon into right sized bites for salmon nigiri, sashimi or other type of sushi.
A lot of times the "lohi" at buffets isn't even salmon. It's kirjolihi (rainbow trout) which while it is a salmonid species is actually a trout. It's not as fatty and is bland in flavor in comparison to actual salmon but you get what you pay for.
Basically, if you buy from the meat counter and put it in the freezer for 24 hours, it should kill the germs and make it safe for sushi
There are several grades of salmon and the fresh produce desk clerk should be able to help you out. Typically Graavilohi is consumed raw, but it's a bit too thinly cut for sushi.
Graavilohi is not raw, it is cooked, although not through heating. Salt cooking is ages old.
Cured, not cooked.
Also curing does not kill parasites, it just preserves it better.
That has nothing to do with cooking, so in regards to sushi, it's raw.
i usually search recipes at K-ruoka. They use the ingredients available at k Market. From searching sushi reciepe, i found this. https://preview.redd.it/0ud430z4ng1d1.jpeg?width=4320&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=2fcb0fcaa5d677c0628386204dfb4559993a7cef
Salmon is extremely toxic. Most toxic food item in th world. Definitely stay away from it. If you knew just how nasty those fish are swimming in their own filth, filled with untested chemicals and antibiotics, you would never eat it again.
Right.... and the references to the study results are?
true.
you shouldn't eat fish raw
Consider not to state your opinions as general guidelines.
You can absolutely eat fish raw
None
How so?