SHINKEI-JIME AND IKI-JIME, THE ART OF DESTROYING NERVE TO EXTEND FRESHNESS

1.Put on thick gloves to prevent a live fish from getting burned by the heat of hands. If you don't have gloves, towel or pot holder can be used.

2.Place a fish on sponge mat to avoid rage. If fish moves violently;

• It causes overheating and fish meat get bruised.
• ATP will be exhausted very quickly.
• pH of fish meat drops/becomes acidic.

3.IKI-JIME

Cut the spine and blood vessels at the neck. Even after you disconnect the brain from the nervous system, the spinal cord is still alive and consuming ATP. At this point, fish's heart is still beating and it makes bleeding smooth.

4.SHINKEI-JIME

Insert a steel wire into the neural canal, push toward the tail and wiggle to destroy the spinal cord entirely.

If not destroy the spinal cord, it will send electrical impulses mistakenly to muscle after about 30 min of severance. Impulses make dead fish rage and remaining blood seep into the tissue. Blood decreases meat transparency and increases fishy odor.

5.After death, biochemical reactions which progress in the body damages fish meat in a few minutes. To stop these reactions, put the fish into iced seawater immediately for 5-10 min to chill and remove blood. Ice also has the effect of making salty seawater a moderate osmotic pressure.

6.Keep the fish at 5-10 degrees Celsius in a cooler box for producing "Umami". To prevent the excessive icing, do not leave the fish touching the ice directly. Once Umami is enhanced, a lower temperature close to 0 degrees can keep the palatability longer. When stored at 0 degrees or less, micro-ice crystals growing inside the cell will cause damage to springy texture.