How Sea Urchin (Uni) Is Processed Commercially — How to Make It

(cutting sounds) - This is really therapeutic. (laughs) (upbeat techno music) I've worn uni throughout my career. It's basically umami that's already created for you. It is also called fish butter, sea butter. Nowadays, it is no longer seen simply about sushi. The possibilities are endless. I receive it on a very expensive little wooden tray and we are here to see that process from the beginning. (energetic techno music) We're about to pull out a sea

urchin

. How did these get here? - We have a boat coming from Santa Barbara Island, which is a small island about 20 miles off the coast.

We got another one from San Clemente Island, which is about 60 miles off the coast. - So we sort them here by boat and then we'll take them out... - Of course, yes. - Here to order. - Yes. - They are diving for these, they are collecting them individually by hand. - They collect them individually by hand, one by one. This boat had to go 90 feet, about 90 feet. - Oh, wow. - Yes, about 90 to 100 feet. (energetic techno music) Give it a little hit, yeah. And try to break it down, there you have it. - I understand. - Yes, the mouth, look for the mouth.

There you have it, you have it. (cutting noises) There you go, there you go. - Oh, I kind of like it. We put it in our mouth or beak. - And break it, there you have it. - So there are five pieces per

urchin

. - There are five languages, yes. - I thought there was one per, actually there are five per urchin. After they open, we will take them out. - Without damaging them. - Got it, that's the most important part. So this is salt water. - Yes. - What happens if I accidentally cut one? - They lower a grade.

So they usually go down, you know, a couple of dollars. - Maybe we don't want me here in this part of the process. I'm holding my breath, because I know that one wrong move or if I'm not working delicately enough, it's directly costing you money. We have collected the urchin and now we begin to clean it. - And as you can already see here, there are many different colors for the sea urchin. - Let's talk a little about that. We're in California, so let's talk about California versus Japan. - Right, it's a different species in Japan.

The size is obviously different, the feeding is different. You know, Japanese sea urchin is also very good. - Is this enough to move forward? - Yes that's fine. We are choosing the premium. - So this is the cousin. These blue trays are top quality. - Yes. - The classification to qualify is already beginning to take place right now. - We grade premiums here because we process them a little differently than the other grades. - So the classification is based on color and firmness? - Color, firmness, dryness. - Dryness. - Did you want to try one? - Oh my god, this is incredible. - You could try that color first. - So this is premium. - This is the premium grade, right? - It's so sweet and salty. - Fresh out of the shell.

And this is... - Wow. - A little more orange. - Wow, I've never eaten it so fresh before. - A little different. - It's very subtle, but it's 100% a difference. - Yeah, for about 1,000 pounds of sea urchin, we get about five to ten trays of raw, so... - Wow. So what are the different degrees? Premium-- - We do premium, number one, number two, number three. Enter the alum soaking tank. Alum is a firming agent. - How long does that take? - Sometimes it's as fast as ten minutes, sometimes it's, you know, 40 minutes. - Because the important thing is the texture, you know? - Texture and then you know you want to keep the juice in there too, just because a lot of the flavor is in that. (energetic techno music) We do the final cleaning stage. - Then you continue cleaning them. - Yes.

This is Roberto. He has been with us for 37 years. - 37 years. So we are removing the remaining impurities with tweezers. I am no stranger to working with tweezers. I've never been so nervous working with tweezers, because I'm really trying not to damage the uni. I'm starting to understand why that little wooden tray... - Mm-hm, it costs so much. - It costs a lot. Where is all this university going? - We do a lot of restaurants in Los Angeles, we sell a lot of wholesale. - You can order this online. - Yes. - How am I doing it?

Too slow? - No, no, no, it's okay. (laughs) - Too slow. - Clean again. - This was probably one of my trays. Give me two seconds, give me 30 minutes. Oh, a stack. Now we are finally at the packaging stage. This is what I'm used to seeing. - And this is that premium grade that we were talking about before. Between five and ten trays per 1000 pounds. - Wow, how much is this retail price? - We sell this retailer for $85. And it is 250 grams. - Wow. - We deliver these to restaurants. - The day after leaving the water. - Good.

Many restaurants

make

the mistake of, even sushi restaurants, while using it, they leave it on the counter. And they leave him outside for about an hour. Or even in the kitchen. That will affect the flavor and shelf life. This is Bertha, Katie. He has been with us for 40 years. - 40 years, since the beginning. - From the beginning. We only have maybe two or three women packing this tray. - Good. (energetic techno music) - Did you do that? Was that yours? - Yes. - Not bad. - Right now there is a harsh trial. It's an incredible amount of work to get to this point. - We also have another university that is not a student.

It's all natural. - Oh, wow. - Completely taken out of the shell like you did there. - Good. - The first two pieces you had. I'm going to show you that station. - So here we're going to go straight to taking them out of the shell and cleaning them and we're going to keep them in the salt water that they were just taken out of. - Yes, trays of 100 grams of water packets. (energetic techno music) - Wow, so who's buying this? - This is aimed at many of our retail customers. And right now there are some restaurants that are becoming fashionable. - I didn't even know this existed until now. -Not many people do it, so I'm glad I was able to tell you. - It's really cool to see this. - This here is a metal tray.

They are 100 gram trays. And they are a little more compact. - So from here, these are packaged for FedEx. - Yes Yes. - Well. - This is what Katie did today. - Four uni packs, for Eater. (tape breaking) This one was really special to me because throughout my entire cooking career, I received that little wooden box of perfection. - Good. - But I never knew what was behind it. How it got to that point. So it was really cool to see it from the beginning. Thanks for watching this episode of How to Do It. For more episodes, click here.

And we go straight down. - Let's go down, now we will

make

a cylinder. (Chainsaw engine hum)