Photograph by Katherine Bish
At age 19, he was handcutting lox at Sherman’s Stage Deli. Nineteen years later, you can find Eliott Harris handcuring imported mackerel at Miso on Meramec and single-handedly nudging Clayton’s first sushi restaurant back onto the local radar (or is that sonar?) screen. Like a rowdy school of yellowtail, eight-year-old Miso has cruised, stalled, changed direction, and is now again surging forward. But how can a Johnson & Wales–trained American excel—or even gain respect—in a craft so inherently…Japanese? We’ll let Harris slice it up for you.
When did you take an interest in sushi? Ten years ago, I befriended a sushi chef while working in Vail. He and I were recruited by Atsushi “Ted” Minami to work at his new restaurant, Sato. I got no respect from this guy for six months. Now we’re good friends.
What other sushi training have you had? After the stint in Vail and one at Tsunami in San Francisco, I got hired at Abokado in Miami, four months prior to their opening. A year and a half later, we finally opened up…way over budget. Unfortunately, I was part of the initial budget cutting.
What drew you to Miso and owner Brad Beracha? I saw a posting from an unnamed restaurant, which ended up being Miso. Since I was from St. Louis and since Brad’s chef at Araka had also come from Vail and knew Sato, we all felt an immediate connection. One sushi tasting, and it was done.
Where does St. Louis sushi rate nationally? When I left, there was Tachibana, Ted and Teiko’s, and Sansui. Now there’s a ton of sushi places, but the menus are all similar.
The main difference seems to be the number of sushi rolls. Sushi bars are turning into “roll” houses. And that’s unfortunate. Yes, it’s pedestrian sushi but rolls are the safety zone.
How advanced is the St. Louis sushi diner compared to other major cities? Right with the rest of them. It’s the rolls that sell—here and everywhere. Omakase [chef’s choice] is popular in San Francisco, but even there the big sellers are spicy tuna and California rolls… There’s no escape! What I’ve been trying to do at Miso is introduce new products within the roll, sneaking things in here and there, then seeing if tastes and palates change.
Was the kitchen staff amenable to you changing their menu? Miso is in its eighth year... Everyone was ready for some change. Miso had become a place for young people to gather and drink, and sushi had become secondary. That is changing.
How did you effect that change? The menu is now divided into two sections: the Miso Classics, rolls that made the cut and weathered the storm, and my section, the Miso Revolution, rolls that I created, proven sellers. There are no “let’s see if this sells” items.
Do you have a signature item? The Papasan Roll, a striped-bass roll I created at Tsunami, named in honor of my father. It’s our No. 1 seller…partly because it’s spicy and partly because it’s finished with a blowtorch.
What else will we find at Miso that’s rare or nonexistent in St. Louis? I flew in some Kona Kampachi from Hawaii, a superbuttery fish not often seen here. Aji, a Japanese mackerel that’s not fishy or oily, like other mackerel... I’ve never seen aji here. I can say with confidence that no one’s bringing in this kind of variety or freshness.
I see that you use real wasabi. We use powdered wasabi mixed with water for the majority of orders, but we also have fresh, grated wasabi—it has a multidimensional taste—for use directly on sashimi. It’s a luxury item, but [at $4], affordable.
What is the benchmark to judge serious sushi? The Japanese judge by the quality of the tuna used and the tamago [the traditional Japanese egg omelet]. Many places buy it already prepared, but I love to make it… It gives the chef an opportunity to show his thumbprint. Those in the know have taken notice.
How many different tunas are in your case? Several. Big-eye red is my favorite…it has more flavor than yellowfin. I get big-eye with fat [toro] for the weekend, when I know I can move it and I won’t sit on it.
Rice is another benchmark. How do you know if a place is doing it right? It should be a high-quality, short-grain rice with a subtle firmness and chewiness to it. It’s also important to be able to differentiate the individual grains.
And rice proportions are important. I was trained to be properly judicious with rice… If there were even one or two extra grains of rice in the roll, the chef would pick them off and flick them at me, one by one, while calling me out in front of the whole sushi bar.
Ah, no big deal… He was speaking Japanese. Didn’t matter…his face pretty much said it all.
How about nori [seaweed]. Is it all the same? Not at all…there are 50 different types. I spend extra money here because the few people who eat hand rolls will know the difference.
Do you sell any Kyoto-style, “scattered” sushi? We did chirashi sushi [rice with scattered fish on top], and pressed sushi, but it didn’t sell…that traditional stuff did not sell. But you still have to know the fundamentals. Ted Minami, who was a very visual guy, early on took a small glass and told me: “this is traditional sushi.” Then he took a handful of hashi [chopsticks], placed them in the glass, and as they fanned out, said, “You can’t do this until you master this [the empty glass].” You must know the tradition before you put a spin on it.
Give me an example of “tradition.” You always remove the right side of the fish first. Traditionally, in Japanese boats, the fish were laid on their right side, because the weight of the fish has been on that side. Any properly trained sushi chef knows things like this and always takes off the right side first. It’s fine to do your spin on things, but there is only one way to break down a fish. You must honor the tradition.
Where does sushi go from here? One trend is sushi that’s sustainable: no farm-raised anything, which would eliminate a lot of today’s menu items, the unagis, Atlantic salmon… Demand has outstripped supply to the point where we have tuna wranglers farm-raising bluefins off Australia. The marbling is wrong, the fat content is wrong. But unfortunately, it’s incredibly lucrative.
What does that say about the future of sushi? The increasing number of sushi bars puts an incredible strain on the environment. Sushi quality and the environment are already suffering. Things like wild salmon and tuna will soon be luxuries…that quality will soon be out of reach for the average customer.
Do you have any pet peeves? People that are so close-minded they know they won’t like something. Well, I know that the mackerel I cure is like no mackerel they have ever tasted.
Have you had time to find a new favorite restaurant in St. Louis? We did a tasting menu at Sidney Street recently. It seemed like we tasted every animal in the forest and sea—rabbit, lamb, veal, salmon, swordfish—it was just awesome, one of the best meals I’ve had since San Francisco.
Where else do you like to eat? Duff’s. I put off culinary school for a year to work for [chef] Jimmy Voss there. It’s totally from scratch, unpretentious, old-school, waiters with master’s degrees, some who have been there 30-plus years. Six months ago, they finally installed a [point of sale] system, something commonplace in the industry for years, but they’d been using handwritten tickets since they opened. And these incredibly smart waiters were grumbling at having to learn something “new.”
