How Japan fell in love with salmon sushi

The Norwegian campaign behind Japan's love of salmon sushi | The Japan Times:

"Look at the menu of any sushi shop in Japan and you will almost certainly see salmon: fatty, tender and bright orange. And for good reason, in a 2017 survey by the seafood company Maruha Nichiro, the fish was found to be the most popular neta (topping) for the sixth year in a row, ranked far higher than the more traditional tuna and halibut.

 But salmon is a relatively new addition to the sushi menu making its rise to popularity remarkable, a story that is both an allegory of shifting taste trends across Japanese demographics and the opening of one of Japan’s most iconic cuisines, sushi, to the world.

 So swift has been salmon’s success that there is a stark generational divide when it comes to which neta is preferred. Many older Japanese start with lean white fish and work their way up to tuna, while younger generations prefer salmon.

 “20 years ago was when everything changed,” says Hideki Koike, the head chef at Masukomi Sushi Bar in Yurakucho, Tokyo. “There are still some restaurants without salmon,” he says. “But the demand is too great. You just have to serve it.”

 Behind salmon’s rise to popularity is the lesser-known story of a carefully executed Norwegian marketing campaign: Project Japan.

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