【Reading】にしん

【English Name】Herring

Nishin (Pacific herring) is a migratory saltwater fish of the family Clupeidae, 30 to 35 cm in body length. The back is blue-black and the belly silvery white, and in sushi it is classified among the hikarimono (shiny-skinned fish). Widely distributed in the North Pacific and the Sea of Japan, it is also called harutsuge-uo (spring-announcing fish) because it migrates to the Hokkaido coast in spring to spawn. Its season is spring to early summer, when it is rich in fat and can be eaten raw as sashimi or nigiri sushi, and it is also often vinegar-cured (sujime) for nigiri. The salt-preserved roe is used as kazunoko in New Year's dishes, and the dried product migaki-nishin is used in local dishes throughout the country, such as Kyoto's nishin-soba. The catch plummeted from the 1950s onward, and today imported product is the mainstream.