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Why is the education of a sushi chef so insanely long?
- Red_Tarsius 11y agoKaz Matsune's insights on the training of suchi chefs are very insightful: http://www.quora.com/What-is-it-like-to-train-to-be-a-master-sushi-chef/answer/Kaz-Matsune-1 http://www.quora.com/What-is-it-like-to-train-to-be-a-master... I was also surprised to find out how difficult it was to make good sashimi: Does a sashimi chef really need that much skill? http://www.quora.com/Sushi/Does-a-sashimi-chef-really-need-that-much-skill http://www.quora.com/Sushi/Does-a-sashimi-chef-really-need-t...
- asanagi 11y agoThis site wants me to sign in with a social media account just to read the content.
- gwern 11y agoWell, you could accept at face-value the self-congratulating laudatory first answer... or you could look at how apprenticeships traditionally work, the low wages, concepts like hidden equity, and the sale of restaurants to successors.
- ableal 11y ago"And Jacob served seven years for Rachel", a very old and instructive tale ...
- gjkood 11y agoTo be able to eat Fugu and still live to tell about it?
- joshuaheard 11y agoPart of the Japanese culture is the achievement of perfection. One will never achieve perfection in art, such as making sushi, hence the paradox.
- jl6 11y agoI'll stop short of a comparison between sushi mastery and programming but I recognise the feeling when the more advanced your skills, the further you recognise you are from (unattainable) perfection.
- redcups 11y agoSemi-related: "Jiro Dreams of Sushi", a excelent 90minute documentary movie about "Jiro", an 85-year-old sushi master is available on YouTube w/ english subs: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GYN7p8dvr64 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GYN7p8dvr64 Great watch, even if you never had sushi or don't like sushi. The extreme drive for perfection is admirable.
- MrJagil 11y agoYes, it's an excellent film. Makes you yearn for sushi, though you quickly realize that whatever sushi is in your vicinity, is not what you're actually craving; it's a taste of Jiro's mastery. Apparently, Tampopo is in a similar vein (though fiction) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0092048/?ref_=fn_al_tt_9 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0092048/?ref_=fn_al_tt_9
- kaeluka 11y agoTampopo is excellent. You must watch it. And I must watch it again.
- astrange 11y agoKeep in mind that Sushi Jiro isn't even in the top 10 (or 20?) ranked places in Tokyo on tabelog, although the low reviews might be since Jiro is so rude to everyone who comes in, especially the foreigners. Sushi Sawada is a 3 Michelin star place in Tokyo run by a former truck driver who's studied for less than ten years. http://www.andyhayler.com/restaurant/sushi-sawada http://www.andyhayler.com/restaurant/sushi-sawada
- DanielBMarkham 11y agoMaybe I'm mistaken, but when I read stories of succesfull startups (aside from the usual startup porn), I keep hearing stories of people who didn't know. Sure, they had ideas, intuition, a deep intuition about where the market was -- but they didn't really know. So they tried experiments and learned. Then they did that some more. The constant refrain is intellectual humility and seeking to understand the people they are trying to help at a deep subconscious level. Contrast this to the way I and many others think about various skills. We take a few classes, we play around and are able to achieve some simple level of competence. Somebody then gives us a certificate or other form of public "gold star". Then we feel like we know something. Socrates was right: true wisdom comes from understanding how little you know and using all of your energy instead to concentrate on asking better questions.
- stephengillie 11y agoWhen you don't know, the fastest way to learn is to find someone who does know, and ask them. If one sushi chef likes another chef's sushi, why doesn't the one just ask the other how to make it? Because of social reasons?
- rifung 11y agoThey probably do, but I also imagine that a lot of things just can't be taught and instead come from experience. For example, I used to train with an Olympic gold medalist in badminton, and he would tell me that the thing I really need to bring my playing to the next level is to be able to take risks and gamble by predicting what the opponent was going to do. The theory made complete sense: you just need to be able to guess with hopefully high accuracy what they were going to do so that you could take advantage of it and it's fine because even if you are wrong sometimes you just still end up positive. Of course, the problem is you can't actually really assign probabilities to your guesses and you might have less than a second to decide what to do. I imagine this is the same with making sushi. You might understand that if a fish is a certain way, you need to add more rice, or vice versa, but you can't just "measure" the fish and instead go off your intuition. Honestly I don't know a thing about making sushi but the post described having to go off intuition, and it's just not something that can really be taught easily.
- bane 11y agoLanguages all seem to lack the right word for it. "Mastery", "wisdom" etc. all don't seem to quite capture the essence of it. I'm frequently glad for Heinlein's invention of the word "grok" to finally give a name to it. I just wish it was a prettier word.
- ableal 11y agoThere's http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epiphany_(feeling) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epiphany_(feeling) , although it's not a verb, and would probably be rather weirded if verbed. (That page ends up referencing, among other things, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satori http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satori , which may go well with sushi.)
- bane 11y agoI think Satori is translated into English as "understanding in fullness". 'Grok' has always seemed to mean to me something kind of like this, where no further epiphanies are possible.
- diminoten2 11y agoExcept grok simply means to comprehend/understand something to the level of competence. I've never heard of anyone using grok to mean something along the lines of "mastery".
- mercer 11y agoFor me it's somewhere in between 'competence' and 'mastery', but really slightly different from both. I suppose that's why the term exists separate from 'competence' and 'mastery'. I'd say 'grok' generally means that you truly understand something in a fundamental way, rather than just being 'competent' or 'masterful' at that thing. It's a crucial step on the path to mastery, but mastery might still require a lot of practice. I find 'Your problem with Vim is that you don't grok vi [1]' to be a classic example of proper usage. It explains fundamental principles of vim's 'grammar'. Once you've read and understood it, you 'grok' vim. But even though this knowledge is crucial in being a 'master', it does not make you one. That would require a lot of practice (in this particular case, for me, a few weeks). I've had similar experiences with functional programming. There was a point, after much reading, where I felt that I truly 'grokked' the approach, but I'm still far away from being a master at functional programming. Old imperative habits die hard. [1]:http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1218390/what-is-your-most-productive-shortcut-with-vim/1220118#1220118 http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1218390/what-is-your-most...
- bkeroack 11y agoIt's only "insane" by myopic Western/American standards. Look at the martial arts of Japan (Judo, Jujitsu) where to earn a black belt--which is traditionally not the end of learning but merely symbolizes understanding of the basics--takes at least 10 years of dedicated study. Since martial arts began to be "Americanized" in the ~1980s, we now see black belts handed out to 8 year old children after a year or two of study (in fairness, Tae Kwon Do is the more common offender in that regard).
- JoeAltmaier 11y agoTo be fair, the black belt implies only mastery of the standard practices of the discipline. It was originally the only belt awarded, and usually after a year or two of study. So nothing has fundamentally changed, except that now there are more degrees of belts.
- stephengillie 11y agoThe further differentiation of belt rank is an Americanization of the art - it's equivalent to handing out Participant medals once every few months. When I learned, we had 9 ranks. Today, most studios have more than 27, so every form and throw and move has its own test and belt. It's maddening, but it's not unlike unit testing. (Should we apply principles of software development to martial arts education?)
- coryl 11y agoThis depends entirely on the art though. Arts like Tae Kwan Do or Karate have gone free for all, with many belt systems and rankings thanks to bastardization via profit motive. Judo and Brazilian Jiu Jitsu however have been a lot more successful at keeping its bar high. In general, the skill level of a purple belt in any population of purple belts will fall in a tighter spectrum.
- sp332 11y agoIt's insane because it covers a very narrow range of topics. We make people doctors after 8 years of study, only a few of which involve actual practice.
- tgb 11y agoCan a blinded panel pick out top quality sushi? I hear sommeliers can't do so for wine, often failing to do well even at identifying red versus white. My first cynical guess for why the education is so long is that customers will pay more for it, regardless of whether or not the product itself benefits. Then again, I barely eat sushi.
- mahranch 11y ago> Can a blinded panel pick out top quality sushi? Since fish can vary from practically tasteless to overpowering, it probably depends on the type of fish. But I've seen people can eat sushi and tell you the exact temperature based on the flavor. Or what part of the ocean the fish came from based on the flavor. Those are pretty objective metrics. Then there's also the whole "people end up in the hospital if you screw up". If you're a poor and unclean sushi chef, you are going to make people sick eventually.
- JoeAltmaier 11y agoThat sound impressive, unless they didn't actually prove their claim. Did someone have a thermometer to stick in the fish? Did someone have evidence the fish came from that part of the ocean? They are objective ONLY if they were actually measured.
- webnrrd2k 11y ago> Or what part of the ocean the fish came from based on the flavor I can tell you what part of the ocean any fish came from too: The watery part. It's true, but not very useful. Other than that kind of statement, how do you know what they say is true? It reminds me of the Shakespeare quote about the vasty deep: Glendower: I can call spirits from the vasty deep. Hotspur: Why, so can I, or so can any man; But will they come when you do call for them?
- amit_m 11y agoWould you be able to tell apart a pizza from a top italian restaurant and a microwaved instant pizza? The differences between top-grade sushi and bad sushi are just as obvious, you really don't need to be an expert. By the way, in japan there is a highly developed market for fish with many levels of quality, so the expensive restaurants get the best parts of the best fish and the leftovers end up in cheaper places.
- imjk 11y agoHe explains things well generally, and then lists off a bunch of different examples, but I don't think we gets specific enough. For example, he says, "I think my nigiri is still far from perfect: could use improvement to reach the perfect fish and rice balance with firmness and texture." Why does this take years as opposed to taking standardized pieces of fish and testing by simply adding more or less rice to it. Why would this process take years? I get what he's saying in general, that things can be infinitely improved, but why years and decades?
- csours 11y agoProbably because there is more than just nigiri on the menu... and there is more than one kind of fish, etc.
- imjk 11y agoYeah I get that, and of course I'm just picking at just one example. But if you watch the Jiro movie, there's an apprentice who spends a full year just learning to beat an octopus. His job for one year is simply to beat an octopus to learn how to tenderize the meat. The same goes for making sushi rice. Why do these chefs have to dedicate themselves for a year to learn how to make rice when surely it can be taught in a week to a point of minimal palatable difference.
- CocaKoala 11y agoBecause they're not going for "minimal palatable difference", they're going for "perfect".
- jbhatab 11y agoI completely agree. It's just a process. The people trying to say that it takes years are just glorifying old standards
- Red_Tarsius 11y agoToday people are still buying hand-made portrait paintings. They could easily spend x10 less and take a photo or hire a digital painter. However, they still choose the old, irrational way. The process itself is the value. The years spent mastering the little things is the sacrifice that makes it valuable to the costumer. In return, the chef follows the path to satori by sticking to his chosen kata, the way. Japanese work ethic is deeply rooted in the zen tradition.
- Puts 11y agoProgramming should be like this. When you're in your twenties thinking you know everything you should have have an old master slapping you on the writs telling you that even if you think you are - you actually are not ready building real systems yet. ;-)
- Red_Tarsius 11y agoOlder programmers may not know the latest hip language and frameworks, but are closer to the essence of their craft. Past experiences open the mind to patterns and ways of doing the 20yo code monkey can't quite conceive yet.
- jbhatab 11y agoAnd 20 year olds have a perspective of the world that older generations can't appreciate. Who's to say which has more value? We shouldn't glorify youth or age, just quality.
- loco5niner 11y agoThat may simply be because they know better ;-)
- rayiner 11y agoI don't think programming is any different. It takes years and years to build an intuition for what works and what doesn't, to develop the theoretical knowledge that allows you to immediately know when your problem can be solved by a well-known algorithm (or when your problem has already been reduced to the halting problem!), to be able to predict from observation where the root of a bug will be found, etc. You have to read a lot of code and write a lot of code to be able to develop taste.
- kaeluka 11y agoPeople should see the "Bite of China" series: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FRHNa9qdtlw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FRHNa9qdtlw It contains plenty of examples of amazing craftsmanship.
- zyxley 11y agoI wonder how much training sushi chefs had when it was first invented during the Edo period. Sushi then was a cheap fast food you ate with your hands, and for a long time only a part-time side business for chefs who worked with other foods.