Recipe for Uni: Catching a Meal of Urchin

December 1999 - January 2000

This is an article from WaveLength Magazine, available in print in North America and globally on the web.

by Dan Lewis

INGREDIENTS

1 diving mask (wetsuit is optional, a hood helps)
1 sturdy knife to pry the urchins off
1 leather work glove to grab the urchin
1 urchin bed (in exposed rocky areas)
1 low tide (the lower the better)
a bit of tamari soy sauce some wasabi (green horseradish paste)

PREPARATION

Seal-land on the rocky shore, or have someone raft up with you while you jump overboard. (I prefer to keep my wetsuit dry, and wear it after diving-also, it's easier to get down to the bottom withour the wetsuit's buoyancy.) As you descend, look carefully at your prey-you might as well get the biggest urchin you can on each dive! Try both the red and purple ones, to see which you prefer.

Quickly jam the knife underneath the urchin, before it can clamp on (if it clamps on, don't fight it as you've already lost the contest-choose another). Twist the knife to pry the urchin off. It will float free (or begin tumbling downward, if found hand, gently. Try not to drop the knife. Swim back to the surface, and place the urchin in the prearrranged location-a sack held by your friend, in the front of your cockpit, or whatever. Avoid panicky movements-remind your friends that handling urchins is just like sleeping on a bed of nails- hold the urchin with both hands to distribute the pressure, and the spines will not penetrate. If they do, seek medical aid-they're not fatal, but are mildly poisonous.

The cold water tends to limit your harvest. One or two is enough for a group, unless you have any connoisseurs amongst you-then get 1 each for those people.

Go to a warm, sunny beach (a cold, drizzly beach will do in a pinch), and prepare to clean the urchins. Hold the knife's tip against the urchin's shell-wrap your fingers around the end of the handle, and hit that end with your other palm. Once the blade pierces the shell, one twist should neatly split the urchin in two.

Inside you will find a ghastly mess of guts, membranes and partially digested seaweeds (these animals are grazers). Shake out all his loose material, and you will spy the cherished goal of this cold and macabre enterprise-the bright orange gonads of the urchin. Did I say gonads? Just tell your friends it's the eggs, or they'll begin to lose their appetite.

Use a spoon to scrape out the orange sections- five to an urchin, shaped like sections of a grapefruit. Carefully wash away the remaining bits of red membrane and green seaweed.

This delicacy is best eaten raw. If you want to get fancy, squeeze a bit of wasabi onto each section, and sprinkle on a bit of soy sauce. A practical and visually appealing presentation is to serve each piece of uni on a blue mussel half-shell- open your mouth, tip the shell, and down the hatch!

A word of warning-the urchin eggs are an acquired taste. For first-time users, a small piece of one section is plenty. I found it fairly revolting my first time, but as I survived my first taste, curiousity got the better of me, and I tentatively nibbled at a bit more, then a bit more. The sweet, milky, seafoody taste grew on me, and now I am a full-on addict, known to endure near-hypothermia for a few sweet morsels!

For the less adventurous, urchin eggs can be cooked, although I've never tried it. Just fry them up in butter and garlic.