This Week's Fish — Bafun Uni, White Salmon, Scallops
Operating fully at Rice Market, seven days a week. Bafun Uni is available in limited quantity — reserve online. Fujisan White Salmon from Shizuoka is back. Nagasaki Bluefin Tuna in all cuts as always. For delivery orders, you can schedule your preferred hour within the same day.
A scheduling note: we will be closing for one week starting Tuesday, May 27th and reopening on Wednesday, June 4th. Keita will be in Japan for the direct sake sourcing meetings described in last week's update. During the closure, the counter at Rice Market will be staffed by Rice Market team members for any purchases you can make in person, but online ordering and delivery will be paused.
Violin Wine — Coming to Rice Market
Will from Violin Wine, Oregon will be visiting Washington DC in early June, and we will host a tasting event on the evening of June 5th. Tickets will be released shortly — watch the Rice Market Ticketleap page and @keita_sashimi_dc for the announcement.
Violin is one of the most thoughtfully made small producers in Oregon, and Rice Market will be carrying the widest range of their wines available anywhere on the East Coast — from their Willamette Valley expressions to the single-vineyard Temperance Hill bottlings. Two vertical opportunities in particular are worth highlighting for the June 5th tasting:
- Sojeau Chardonnay 2019 vs 2021 — a direct comparison of the same wine across two very different vintages. 2019 was a warm, generous year in the Willamette Valley; 2021 was cooler and more restrained. Tasting them side by side demonstrates what vintage variation actually means in practice rather than in theory.
- Willamette Valley Pinot Noir 2021 vs multi-vintage (2020–2021) — Pinot Noir blended across vintages is a different philosophy from single-vintage bottling: the goal is consistency of style rather than expression of a single year. Tasting both illuminates the choices a winemaker makes about what to prioritize.
Sake Trip Update
The Japan trip departs May 27th. The sake meetings are on June 1st. We will report back in the June 4th update with what we learned and where things stand on the direct import arrangement. If you are curious about sake or have specific breweries or styles you have been trying to source in DC, now is a good time to let us know — we will take requests to the table.
On Violin's Temperance Hill vineyard: Temperance Hill is one of the Willamette Valley's most celebrated single-vineyard sites — high elevation, volcanic soil, consistently producing Pinot Noir and Chardonnay of unusual concentration and longevity. The fact that Rice Market will carry Violin's Temperance Hill expressions is not something you'll find easily elsewhere on the East Coast.