I can’t really comment on sushi places. Just don’t "get them’.
My issue is that all the selections are served on identical rice with identical seasonings. I get palate fatigue after several items - everything tastes ‘almost identical’. I do get the different textures of the fish (not the rice of course) - but the flavours all meld together - and are dominated by that rice/vinegar flavour. I’m also mostly disappointed by the beverage selection as well.
Just a ‘blind spot’ for me.
But, I do save a pile of money by avoiding sushi places!
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Love your last comment! 
Sorry! Not a fan of Lin and/or Shoushin! Prefer Zen instead!
IMO, Lin has an ego as big as a Michelin tire!! Cannot take negative or constructive criticism from reviewers!
Once, he even send me a private e-mail trashing me and questioning my qualification and back ground as a food critic to dare critique his cuisine, the gimmicky presentation and the price he is charging!
I almost wanted to respond by saying ’ when I first ate first class sushi at Jiro and Saito in Tokyo, he was still wearing diapers! ', but decided to just ignore him instead!
Even ’ Michelin star trained ’ Toronto chefs, the calibre of David Lee, Patrick Kriss and Daniel Hadida ( Pearl Morissette ) were all open to constructive advises!
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I am envious of your dining cv if that’s a thing Charles 
Btw my go to sushi place kibo secret garden has introduced a 180$ omakase! Might go for splurge let’s see saito is still not on my list yet
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Nothing when compare to ’ Estufarian ', my friend!! His is super-impressive!
I’m kindergarten whilst he is PhD!!
Thank you Charles.
It’s all “Practice, practice, practice”!
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It’s funny, because palate fatigue is why I don’t drink wine! A sip is enough. Sometimes I will have a 5 ounce glass. Not interested in more wine after that.
I save lots of money not buying wine. Of course, I don’t avoid wine to save money. I realized I enjoy Coke, a Manhattan or a whiskey sour more than any $17 glass of wine. I like some wines- specifically Amarone- but not enough to pay $120 or whatever it costs for a bottle in a restaurant. I will buy a $60 -$100 bottle of Amarone to share with guests or give as a gift.
I don’t order sushi that often, maybe one higher end sushi experience a year, but I like the variety of textures of the different fish and shellfish.
Vive La Difference!
I came to food via wine (mostly blind tastings) so it’s an important component for me.
And texture (in food) has become more important to me with age - I’m guessing that the ability of tastebuds to ‘discriminate’ declines with age (although modified by experience). I’ve not found too much ‘scientific’ research on this, although there’s much speculation out there.
My initial interest was sparked by totally losing my sense of taste (while at University) yet retaining my sense of smell. Both of those senses had almost no medical body of knowledge - back then (and probably today) no doctors routinely tested either of those senses yet sight, sound and even touch (reflexes) were commonly tested.
I’ve subsequently sought out any and all taste/smell tests that are available and I have no doubt there are massive differences between ‘people’, although I totally discount the ‘supertaster’ theory relating to wine. It just reflects differences that are not (necessarily) related to greater ‘sensitivity’ - rather to different (probably heredity related) configurations comparable to eye colour, body shape etc.
Some people are definitely able to ‘appreciate’ premium sushi, or premium wines, and multiple other examples (e.g. caviar,) while finding other foods almost indistinguishable. Personally I can (usually) identify lamb from different regions, but cannot do it for beef. I vastly prefer Del Monte bananas to the other common brands - I (almost) always know if an alternative is proffered (AmuseGirl can attest to this) . And I recoil at Florida Grapefruits or juice, while embracing many other sources.
In summary - we’re just different - or have different preferences. And if someone else revels in ‘top’ sushi or ‘top’ wines- good luck to them - it’s worth it to them and please enjoy the experience.
If we all had the same ‘tastes’ I wouldn’t be able to afford my favourites!
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I agree.
I can also tell the difference between lamb from different regions, as well as pork , milk, asparagus from different regions. I only buy Canadian and American asparagus in Canada.
I don’t eat grapefruit, at all.
I think I kept trying and ordering wine with meals in my 30s and 40s, because other people kept telling me it was a component. I realized over the past 5 years that I don’t appreciate it or miss it.
Preferences, tastes, experiences. There’s no accounting for taste.
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With all due respect, based on your previous reviews and preferences (Kaito, Zen) you prefer farmed and previously frozen fish for their value proposition — which is fine, actually — but your opinion and expertise on high end edomae sushi needs to be taken with a grain a salt. Having sat in front of Jiro or Saito once really doesn’t mean much. What year did you go to Saito, btw? What do you know of Saito’s ego? None of this has bearing on actual food of course. Michelin does not assess the chef’s ego do they?
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What an entrance to a discussion board.
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It is against my character to launch into a heated debate/argument with a total stranger on an open public forum.
However, since you questioned and asked, I will entertain you this one time. First off, I wanted to say, I visited Tokyo/Japan almost once every year for the most part of the past two decades, staying for at least a week or more each time! During those periods, I have eaten in many instances, repeatedly, at more Michelin star and high-rating tabelog sushi-ya ( and other eateries ) than you can imagine!..Kyubey, Sawada, Harutaka, Umi, Yoshitake… as well as the two aforementioned establishments. I ate at Saito for the first time whilst staying at Akasaka’s ANA hotel, when they were just a one star and an easy walk-in. I went through their promotion process all the way to his opening a 2* branch at Hong Kong’s Fourseasons hotel! A similar process which I was lucky enough to experience with Alain Passard of Paris 3* L’Arpege! Hope these would clarify some of the ???
BTW, even if Saito-san has a big ego, at least with a reputation as one of the world’s best sushi master chef, he can back it up with his Michelin 3* and top tabelog rating.
Lastly, FYI, I only joined Hungry Onion a short few months ago. During which time, the ONLY sushi specific post which I contributed was the take-out Sushi-Omakase from ‘Cho-San’ in Markham. The Neta used for the Nigiri were all wild/organic, almost all sourced from Japan and/or European waters. As such, I am at a lost pertaining to your comment…" based on your previous reviews and preferences (Kaito, Zen) you prefer farmed and previously frozen fish for their value proposition "???
The only other Japanese related posting was that of an ’ Izakaya ’ typed meal which I tagged along with my kids. Not an appropriate example to use to reflect my taste and requirement towards fine quality Japanese food.
My 2 cents and for me Case Closed!
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You seem to have strong opinions on our member. Do you mind introducing yourself to us?
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If you don’t already know, I recommend you read the book called Taste by Barb Stuckey. She breaks down taste into its components and asserts that 75-95% of what we taste is actually smell. That’s why people say when they have the cold/flu and their nose is stuffed, they can’t taste anything. She also describes conditions where people have lost their taste but can still smell (like you). And the ‘supertaster theory’ is real and her husband is one and he has to order bland food because the flavors appear too strong.
Yes, I do recall from CH your dislike of Jackie but are you sure it was him who sent that email? I’d be surprised if he actually did that. Others have opined about his ego but that also drives who he is: confident, ambitious and he works very hard studying his craft intensely. Not to say he’s there or even close to it but most people who succeed at the highest level have big egos.
it was Jackie himself alright!
That one is new to me - I’ll chase it down.
I’ve encountered several ‘supertasters’ and in every case, I concluded they were just more sensitive to ‘bitter’ (I’m oversimplifying, but not by much).
In particular, they are NOT more sensitive to ‘sweet’ - in a blind test (several years back) I was able to place 10 ‘doctored’ wines in exact order of sweetness - NONE of the supertasters achieved that.
But always happy to revisit - we used to do a test in my (I was a Director) ‘Wine Club’ . We’d take a wine, pour some out, filter what remained and then serve 3 glasses of wine - asking the candidate to identify which two were identical - only one person was consistently right - a ‘supertaster’ who was also a wine judge (and deserved to be so).
I failed!
My ‘bible’ is Exploring The Science Of Flavor by Hervé This.
And a slight aside - spice is perceived by the saliva glands - rather then the tongue. So blandness (unless ‘concentrated flavor’ is meant) may not be an issue for a ‘supertaster’.
Or possibly we define the term completely differently - I use it in a winetasting context.
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An update :
I have acquired the book and am partway through. Essentially, the observations are consistent with my previous experiences, but I’m having difficulty with the 'conclusions ’ (although she’s very careful to emphasize these are statistical, rather than applicable to everyone ).
In the preamble (where she identifies her partner as a supertaster ), she outlines the “accepted wisdom” (I paraphrase ) based on the density of 'taste buds ’ (oversimplification ), she identifies the 'lowest density population ’ as ,non-tasters (to be fair, she totally rejects that nomenclature, although the literature commonly uses it).
However, despite changing the name, the implicit assumption that there is a ’ group with numerically fewer taste buds ’ seems to influence the conclusions.
Coincidentally (or perhaps not - I’m still working my way through ), the size of this group is given as 15% of the population, very similar to the proportion who ‘can’t taste bitter’.
My original conjecture was that supertaster and ability to sense bitter were highly correlated, which ( to me) was not necessarily causal.
Because I can, I could postulate that men are more intelligent than women, as they have larger brains and consequently more brain cells! (Please note this is only a hypothetical postulate ). But isn’t that what is being done with ’ number of taste buds ’ - surely (I claim ), it’s 'how you use them ’ rather than 'total number ’ that’s important.
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Lol
I think the author’s argument was based on the density of the taste buds theory, not necessarily size of the tongue. Intuitively, this kinda makes sense. Like, it’s not the size of the TV but rather the more pixels per square inch (density) in your TV monitor that makes for a more precise or detailed picture.
Thus to refine your brain size analogy, it’s not the size of the brain that counts, it’s the density of the brain cells. I guess that’s where the idea of “airhead” comes from… LOL! 
