Otoshi three kinds including octopus sashimi タコ刺身、酢味噌和えとおとうし三種

This was the starting lineup for dinner one weekend evening. I had just come back from our Japanese grocery store burdened with all kinds of "goodies"; "ikura" いくら salmon roe, boiled octopus leg, fish cake, steamed squid salad Chinese style, and other items. So this was a quick and easy starter to prepare.  I used a store-bought "sashimi" soy sauce  刺身醤油 (small bottle shown below). Regular soy sauce is made with a mixture of soybeans, Koji rice, salt and water. It is somewhat watery and clear in appearance. In contrast this "sashimi" soy sauce is made differently. It uses either Tamari たまり, which is made from 100% soybeans (instead of a mixture of soybeans and koji-rice)  or it uses "double prepared" soy sauce or "Saishikomi-shoyu" 再仕込み醤油.  This is double prepared because soy sauce is substituted for the water used in regular soy sauce and is brewed again to make the "double prepared" soy sauce. As a result of this double brewing, it is thicker and more viscous than regular soy sauce. Depending on the brands, it may also contain "dashi" or "mirin" or other additions. For us, the difference is subtle but we occasionally have this special soy sauce for sashimi.

I served octopus two ways; one was sliced thinly with a wave pattern, which is called "sazanami-giri" 漣切り meaning "ripple cut".  My version is more like "big wave cut". This is done so that when dipping in wasabi and the afore-mentioned sashimi soy sauce, the surface will hold the sauce. The other is a tip portion cut into small chunks and dressed in "karashi sumiso" 芥子酢味噌.

The dressing is a mixture of miso, sugar and  and rice vinegar in 2:1:1 ratio and added prepared Japanese hot mustard to taste. Recently, I have reduced the vinegar (as per my wife's request) and added a small amount of hot water (from our "instant" hot water dispenser using RO filtered water). This makes the dressing milder and also dissolves the sugar better. I also added small chunks ("rangiri" 乱切り) of American mini cucumber.

Shown below is store-bought fish cake which we like. I grilled it in the toaster oven and dressed with ginger soy sauce (mixture of grated ginger and soy sauce). Since I had chives, I also added chopped chives.

This is another store bought drinking snack made of steamed squid with a "Chinese" style dressing called  "Ika-chuka-sansai" イカ中華山菜. Depending on the brand, the taste and ingredients vary  a little but this is not bad at all (except some of  the large chunks of squid was too chewy for my wife and she graciously transferred them to me).

This is the only one I really made. Cucumber suno-mono with small dried shirasu (whitebait/dried sardine hatchlings) garnished with ikura  しらす入りきゅうりの酢の物. Thinly sliced cucumber (American mini-cucumber), salted with moisture wrung out, mixed with "shirasu" (frozen in a package), dressed in sweet vinegar and garnished with ikura.

For a change, we started the evening with  tokubetsu junmai "Suigei" 特別純米酒　酔鯨 sake from Kochi in Shikoku 高知、四国. This is a  dry sake with acidity but not yeasty at all and went well with these snacks.