Uni: murasaki, bafun and aka 雲丹

Also called sea urchin, uni sushi

Sea urchin. Sushi counters mainly use murasaki uni (purple), bafun uni (more orange and richer) and, in western Japan, the rarer aka uni.

Uni is the part of the sea urchin you eat, the gonads. Different species taste different, so a good counter will tell you which one you are getting.

Bafun uni (Hemicentrotus pulcherrimus) is the small one with brighter, richer roe. Aka uni (Pseudocentrotus depressus) is a different urchin that lives only around Japan, from southern Kyushu up to northern Honshu, and is mostly eaten in western Japan.

It gets confusing because fish markets also call reddish bafun uni “aka uni”. When a chef says the aka uni is finished for the season, ask which one they mean.

See alsoIkura