Put this dish in front of your average American and they’ll throw on a face of disgust. Pour soy sauce on it and watch them jump out of their seat.
This is the Ika Odori Don, or “Dancing Squid Bowl”. It’s a popular dish in northern Japan containing salmon roe, rice, seaweed, and one really dead, but really fresh, squid.
“When you pour soy sauce on the dead squid, the muscles contract in response to signals from neurons, which transmit signals around the body by means of a series of sequential influxes of sodium across the cell membrane into the neuron.”
If you think that’s weird, count yourself lucky that the squid is dead. There’s a whole mode of sea food consumption called “Odorigui” (literally “dancing eating”) where they eat creatures live, such as the squid, octopus, and gobies.
