>>38795910Know what you're looking for a know how fresh it is, that's basically it. Pretty much any half decent grocery store will have farmed Norwegian Atlantic salmon that's generally pretty good. However that's just atlantic, there's sockeye and king and the subgeneres of those. Farm raised generally means sashimi grade for salmon, "sushi grade" doesn't refer to anything specifically other than "not old as balls and not known to have been infected." Norwegian farms these days have pretty good standards, southeast asian farms you should stay away from. You should also know what you wanna do with your salmon, the cuts do make a difference. A full fillet is technically 3 major types of cuts, loin, belly, and tail. The belly generally has the highest fat distribution with the lower loin having the 2nd most. The thicker part is the top loin and that's what's generally used for sushi due to the pattern of fat and the thickness of the cut. Rules on exactly what cut to use for sushi are pretty loose, anything thick and fatty enough will work realistically. Sushi almost always uses king or atlantic salmon btw, sockeye and coho have almost no fat comparatively. Ora King salmon which is what Grape bought, is a specialty form of king salmon with an incredibly even fat distribution and lower fat melting point, it's ideal for sashimi or nigiri, I prefer it for nigiri personally. You can pretty much only buy it in the form of fillets or whole, I recommend fillets unless you have a massive amount of room to store extra, those things are huge and about $30 per lb on average. The only things you really need to look out for on salmon are obvious issues, like a film of glop on the meat, major discoloration, tissue degradation (falling apart) and an off smell. Another thing to note is that salmon becomes flaky at around 102F, it really does not take a lot to cook salmon and that's why for nigiri it's generally sliced so thin. The heat from the rice and human mouth are already enough to soften salmon if it's not served weirdly cold. Salmon nigiri is best served very slightly above room temp although most people wouldn't do that because they're scared of room temperture meat for some reason.
