Korean Hoe vs Japanese Sashimi, Why One Is Cut Thick From Live Fish and the Other Thin From Aged

The biggest difference is whether the fish gets used alive and immediately, or caught and then rested for a stretch of time before it gets used. Korean hoe takes live fish lifted out of the tank, prepares it on the spot and cuts it thick; Japanese sashimi takes bled fish, lets it rest in refrigeration for half a day to more than a full day, and cuts it thin. That makes the sensation of chewing them close to opposite. With Korean hoe a crisp springiness arrives first, while on the other side a softness that wraps around the tongue and a deep savory flavor arrive first. The sauces split too. Here, the fish gets wrapped in lettuce or perilla leaf with vinegared chili sauce, soybean paste, garlic and chili; there, a little wasabi goes into soy sauce and each piece gets a dip. The look of the table differs as well. A Busan sashimi table gets laid with close to ten small side dishes, while a Japanese plate of raw fish sits beside little more than shredded radish and a shiso leaf. At the Jagalchi Haean-ro restaurant, eight in ten evening guests dip the first piece in vinegared chili sauce, and the other two start by stirring wasabi into soy sauce. Rather than one being correct, it is a question of what state you want to eat the fish in, so trying both methods alternately on one plate is the fastest comparison there is.

The condition of the fish decides the thickness. Live fish just prepared still has firm muscle, so cutting it thin makes the chew disappear, and it needs to be cut thick for the crisp springiness to come alive. Aged flesh works the other way: the muscle has relaxed into softness, so cutting it thick turns it mushy, and it needs to be cut thin for the savory flavor against the tongue to read clearly. So the difference in thickness is not a matter of taste, it is the result of how the fish was handled. The common thickness at a Korean sashimi restaurant is about that of a chopstick, and the Japanese side is roughly half of that. The resting time differs greatly as well. At a Busan sashimi restaurant, getting the live fish a guest picked onto the table within 10 minutes is the baseline, while in Japan the fish sits in refrigeration anywhere from half a day to several days depending on species, drawing the savory depth out from inside the flesh. White-flesh fish like flounder, rockfish and sea bream have their best springiness in the live state, while red-flesh fish such as tuna only improve with aging, so the species each country favors naturally split as well. That is also the reason the restaurant veteran with over a decade at Jagalchi cuts white-flesh fish thick. We will cut thinner for a guest who asks, but the first plate is worth trying at the standard thickness.

Vinegared chili sauce in a wrap is a method that lays aroma and heat on top of the springiness, while soy sauce and wasabi is a method that gently supports the natural savory flavor of the fish. The Busan way puts one piece of white-flesh fish on a leaf of lettuce or perilla with a little chili sauce, adds a clove of garlic or a slice of chili, and goes in as one mouthful. Thick live fish takes a long time to chew, so the garlic aroma and the sourness of the sauce fold in during that stretch. Japanese raw fish has thin, soft flesh, and laying strong seasoning on it buries the taste of the fish, so a few drops of soy sauce with only a trace of wasabi is the measure. That is why the same flounder leads with aroma when eaten in a wrap and leads with sweetness when eaten with soy sauce. The table at the Jagalchi Haean-ro restaurant comes with vinegared chili sauce, soy sauce, soybean paste and wasabi as standard, and most guests move through them in order, the first two or three pieces with chili sauce, soy sauce in the middle, soybean paste at the end. There is no reason to insist on only one. White flesh generally suits the wrap and fattier flesh suits soy sauce, and adding raw garlic to that turns it into a soju dish while leaving it out makes it a side dish for rice.

Korean sashimi restaurants bring many side dishes because raw fish is treated as an occasion eaten slowly alongside drinks, and Japanese accompaniments are few because raw fish is treated as one plate within a course. A Busan table gets laid first with small dishes of raw seaweed, salted seafood, pickled radish, cabbage salad, bean sprouts and seasoned greens, and the sashimi plate goes on top of that arrangement. When your palate gets heavy partway through the fish, you dip raw seaweed in salted seafood to rinse and go back to the sashimi, which makes the side dishes not decoration but a device for making the fish last. Our side dishes rotate daily based on what is fresh. A Japanese plate of raw fish gets shredded radish, a shiso leaf and some pickled ginger. The palate-rinsing role is the same but the variety is smaller and so is the quantity. In exchange, the flow brings grilled dishes or soup separately after the raw fish, so there is no need to put everything on one plate. Weekend evenings at 7 PM are the busiest at the Jagalchi Haean-ro restaurant, and at that hour the small side dishes often empty before the sashimi plate does. Plenty of side dishes does not mean a smaller portion of fish; read it instead as a setup for eating one plate of sashimi over two hours.

A Korean sashimi occasion ends with rice stirred into a spicy stew simmered from the bones and head left after the fish was cut, while Japanese raw fish sits at the front of a course so rice, miso soup and grilled dishes follow separately behind it. At a Busan sashimi restaurant the spicy stew is the back half of the raw fish. Call for a small rockfish spicy stew at KRW 50,000 (about USD 36) when about half the sashimi is left and the pot arrives as the fish is finishing, and ladling broth and flesh into your side bowl to stir with rice turns a drinking session into a meal. The structure has hot, bracing broth entering a mouth that has eaten cold raw fish for two hours, and the occasion settles with it. In Japan a hot dish follows the raw fish in the same way, but a clear soup or grilled fish follows rather than a bracing spicy stew, and the seasoning is milder. That is why someone used to Japanese raw fish, receiving a Busan table for the first time, finds the spicy stew being the dish after the sashimi the most unfamiliar part. At the Jagalchi Haean-ro restaurant, eight in ten sashimi tables close with the rockfish stew and the rest carry on with charcoal-grilled hagfish as a drinking dish. Deciding the close in advance also makes the sashimi size easy to settle. If you are calling for the stew, one size down is plenty.

Putting soy sauce with wasabi and vinegared chili sauce with wrapping leaves on one small assorted platter at KRW 60,000 and alternating piece by piece is the easiest comparison method there is. We serve white-flesh live fish at the standard thickness, and saying cut a few pieces thin when you order gets half of it cut thin so you can taste both thicknesses together. Pricing is fixed by size with small for two, medium at KRW 80,000 for three, large at KRW 100,000 for four and extra large at KRW 120,000 for five or six, and for an anniversary, premium wild-caught sashimi from KRW 80,000 (about USD 58) goes out at the day-selected species price, built from species like spotted halibut or roughscale sole. The location is 220m from Jagalchi Station (Line 1) Exit 2 toward Jagalchi Haean-ro, about a 3-minute walk. It is two stops from Busan Station on Line 1, so you can be seated 20 minutes after stepping off the KTX, and a taxi runs about 10 minutes and KRW 6,000 to 8,000 from Busan Station, or 20 minutes and KRW 12,000 to 15,000 from Seomyeon. With 190 seats across the first and second floors it takes group dinners, and calling +82-10-8998-4803 ahead for four or more holds both the size and the seat. Afterward, the Jagalchi main hall is a 3-minute walk, BIFF Square 5 minutes and Yeongdo Bridge 7 minutes, which makes it easy to continue on foot. The Yeongdo Bridge deck lifts on Saturdays at 2 PM.