Food Tours · Tour

A Wasabi Set From Your Guide, and a Fish Filleted in Front of You

Ninety minutes and the lowest price of any tour here, which works because the ticket buys guiding rather than a menu: meals are not included and you buy what you want as you go. You meet beside the stairs at the right of the main hall of Tsukiji Honganji, steps from Exit 1 of Tsukiji station, where the guide holds a sign. What the guide brings is a wasabi set of their own. Real wasabi is a rhizome grated against sharkskin and it loses its aroma within about fifteen minutes, which is why almost everything served as wasabi outside Japan is horseradish with dye. Tasting the difference beside a counter of raw fish is the kind of thing that recalibrates what you order for the rest of the trip. There is a fish-cutting demonstration where a chef breaks down a whole fish with traditional knives and technique, and a seafood bowl to follow if you want one. The rest is explanation: the artisan trades still operating in the outer market, the preservation methods that build umami rather than just keep fish edible, and the history of the market and what it meant to Japanese cooking. You also see the working part where professional traders still operate. Up to thirty travellers, guided in English or Japanese. Wheelchair accessible throughout and suitable for all fitness levels.