The rice is faintly brown. The salmon was simmered in soy sauce, sake and sugar, and the liquid left behind was thinned and used to cook the grain, so that the whole bowl tastes of the fish before any fish arrives on top of it. And what arrives on top is the fish twice over: slices of the flesh, and the roe. Some kitchens fold the flesh through the rice and leave only the roe showing.

This is a river-mouth town. Salmon were taken here with beach seine nets where the Abukuma meets the sea, and the dish is said to have begun with fishermen feeding people on days when the haul was large. There is also a story that it was set before Date Masamune when he came to inspect repairs being made to the river.

It is eaten in the autumn, when the salmon come back to the river. But Watari keeps the same method running all year with whatever the season provides: surf clam in winter, mantis shrimp in spring, short-neck clam through the summer. Only the creature changes.

Which suggests the dish is not really about salmon. What the town has actually held onto is the idea of cooking rice in the broth of whatever came ashore that morning, and the autumn version simply has the best name attached to it. The rest are variations on a habit.