My “shore lunch” was in a cafe this weekend, featuring kawahagi, rice, crab soup, daikon pickles and a little seaweed… Fresh is better than out of the can!
The reason for trying Kawahagi on this trip was that last April, a friend and I were out fishing Tokyo bay on a local’s 40′ fishing boat constructed with benches running down both sides… The target specie was the one being consumed and featured on the wall of the restaurant in the above picture. Kawahagi are an ocean fish that one catches about 30′ down just off the bottom… Very challenging as they have a small mouth and suck the clams off a hook. Hard to catch something that works the hook like a sucker while having all the motion of waves, drifting boat altering bottom structure… while attempting to keep the bait steady at 6″-2′ off the bottom where the fish hang out.
Need to be looking for a rubber worm for next time as one has to hook a lot of clams onto the hook to catch this panfish sized ocean fish!