“Sure, except that it was outside, a lot dirtier, more cramped and about 30 degrees hotter.”

“Wow, that’s a lot of Asian people in a small, hot space.”

“Yup.”

One of the best benefits of living in such an Asian-rich area is that there’s access to amazing Asian ingredients all of the time. A couple of weeks ago, I ventured into my local Korean H-Mart to find that the store had flown in an entire bluefin tuna, which meant that I had to have some tuna sashimi and radish salad, of course.

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As you can see, my reaction to seeing this little display of bluefin tuna being hacked to order wasn’t normal. After squealing and clapping, I took a selfie. Actually, now that I think about it, selfies are a pretty normal occurrence in Asian supermarkets.

When tuna is super fresh, the way this bluefin tuna was, you don’t have to do a whole lot with it. I sliced up buttery, Hawaiian poke-sized chunks (about a 1/2 inch cubed; this post here has a good photo of how to go about cutting your tuna). I made a quick ponzu (a citrusy soy sauce) dressing and tossed some radishes, cilantro, scallions and jalapeno together. Together, the tuna sashimi and radish salad made a lovely little lunch appetizer, with a nice, spicy crunch and creamy, creamy tuna.

Seriously, the tuna we had was so fresh that it was creamy, like delicious, fishy butter. I still daydream about it.

For the kids, the jalapeno rounds that I added would have been too spicy for them, so instead I just sliced up fresh chunks of tuna and let them pick at parts of the radish salad as they wanted to. I felt kind of like I was feeding baby birds. I’d cut up a few pieces of tuna, and no sooner had I set it down on the table than it would disappear, and some child would chirp like Oliver Twist:

“Please, may I have some more?”

Eventually we ran out of tuna. I am not made of money, and $20 gets you a scant 7-8 ounces of fresh bluefin tuna, which the kids gobbled in less than 5 minutes. The kids skittered off, and the hubby and I were left with the dregs of radish salad to pick at.

Sometimes I worry that I’m spoiling the kids with food. What’s going to happen when they go to college and realize that the dining hall doesn’t slice up bluefin tuna to order? Is that a legitimate fear to have, as a parent?

I’m thinking maybe not.

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