One of my favorite fishes to eat is raw salmon. (Grilled on a hibachi is also acceptable.) Unfortunately, I haven’t the money nor the time to drive to a Japanese supermarket to buy fresh, “sushi grade” salmon. Therefore, the only time I actually eat salmon sashimi is when I’m at a sushi restaurant, or a poke restaurant. Shame.
I was over at a friend’s house, and I noticed in his fridge a package of farm-raised salmon purchased from Costco. I remarked the fish looked good enough to eat raw - I wonder if we can. To the Reddit! First things first: apparently, “sushi grade” is a bit of a scam. There isn’t any governing USDA rule that qualifies a cut of fish fit to eat raw. It’s all marketing, though I suppose a supermarket better be damn sure it’s absolutely safe if the package claims sushi grade.
Anyways, according to Reddit: Costco farm-fresh salmon should be fine to seat sashimi-style. The fish is delivered frozen to Costco, and the workers thaw it for retail packaging. The frozen part is important because that’s the procedure that kills the bad stuff. If you still have some apprehension, the best practice is to freeze it yourself for seven days after purchase. That should effectively (99% with an asterisk like a Clorox bottle) kill anything that can potentially upset your stomach.
Armed with this newfound information, I bought a package of Costco salmon last week. I cut up the fillets into meal-sized servings (for me, which is about 3/4 a pound), then put it all into the freezer section. A week later - that would be yesterday - I thawed a piece, sliced it up, and prepared the soy sauce for dipping. Verdict: it’s very decent, no worse than the cubed salmon served at poke places.
For a fraction of the cost of the truly fresh stuff from a Japanese supermarket, I can totally get used to buy Costco salmon for a long time to come. Proteins and omega−3 fatty acids, baby.
Yes, my knife skills are poor.