yep

ANyone know if theres a food called masako? i know it's a proper name,
but is there a food with this name too?
thanks.

geoff

Masago = smelt eggs. The little crunchy orange-red bits on a California
roll, for example.

d lutjen

Capelin roe, not smelt roe.

musashi

Masago.
It is the very small redish roe of I think Shishamo (Big Mouth Smelt,
Capelin?).
Used as a main neta in a gunkan maki and also sometimes as a garnish.
M

geoff

I think it can go by either:

Shishamo
$BLxMU5{(B
$B%7%7%c%b(B
Japanese smelt, Shishamo smelt, Japanese capelin
Spirinchus lanceolatus
The roe is called masago, which means "sand."

d lutjen

When you see masago in the U.S., it is invariably capelin roe from Iceland.
I have never seen it any other way be it processed by a Japanese company
other otherwise. Never heard the term "shishamo smelt." We live in "smelt"
country and while capelin and smelt are similar, they are not the same
animal.

Would be interested in how you get "sand" from masago.

geoff

Not to be mean or anything, but by looking in a dictonary.

ma $B??(B + isago $B:=(B = masago

For example, go to
http://www.csse.monash.edu.au/~jwb/c...wwwjdic.cgi?1C
and type "masago" in the KEYWORD field then check yes for "Check if the
keyword is romanized Japanese"

Result:
masago $B??:=(B $B$^$5$4(B "sand"

Or oin Nelson's dicstoinary, under

musashi

Masago does come from the Kanji characters "Ma" (meaning true, genuine) and
Sa (meaning sand, as in Sa-baku meaningg desert)
and my guess is that "go" comes from "ko" as in roe but is left out when
written.
There is a high probability that this is ate-ji (kanji created to fit the
spoken word) as many kanji of names and places
in Hokkaido are taken from the original Ainu word.
Shishamo, often called Big Mouth Smelt, written Willow Leaf Fish in kanji is
an example of this.
English web sites often define masago as "smelt roe" perhaps because of the
term "Big Mouth Smelt".
It is my understanding that the Atlantic Rainbow smelt common to the the New
England area, as well as the several
I think species of "smelts"found on the US werst coast are not the same as
the Shishamo of northern Japan
although if the show the adipose fin they are probably somehow related.
Basically Japan's domestic production of Shishamo could no longer keep up
with demand as early as the 1950s and as a
result Japan imports roe filled capelin from the northern Atlantic countries
from Canada accross to Scandinavia.
So yes it's very likely that most masago comes from capelin from Iceland.
What I find intersting, as one who eats whole Shishamo for breakfast fairly
often, is how it makes economic sense to ship
North Atlantic capelin to China for processing and packaging, then ship it
to the US, which is how I am getting my Shishamo.
This is the same situation as with the Hokkigai caught off Canadian waters.
M

wwerewolff

Anyway, whatever it's called, it's not really all that tasty. It's OK.

geoff

Agreed - Compromise substitute for tobiko in my opinion.