With its Ilse Crawford­­–designed, Art Deco–inspired interiors, seriously pretty tableware (the teapots alone!), and dim sum that tastes as good as it looks, the three-year-old restaurant/bar/gallery space Duddell’s is still the buzziest room in town. No wonder it picked up two Michelin stars. The latest opening from Yenn Wong (Duddell’s, 208 Due­cento Otto, Ham & Sherry) and David Lai (On Lot 10, Neighborhood) is Fish School, hidden down an alley in the Sai Ying Pun neighborhood, just west of Sheung Wan. Don’t be fooled by those glowing fish tanks; this is not your clichéd Chinatown seafood joint. Here, the menu is built around impeccably fresh, thoughtfully sourced fish and shellfish (much of it caught locally), including a pristine marinated raw crab with sea urchin and sticky rice. With a menu as playful as its name, the cheeky SoHo newcomer Ho Lee Fook is an homage to the cha chaan tengs (teahouses) of mid-century Hong Kong, offering twists on Chinese comfort food—roast short ribs with shallot kimchi and jalapeño puree;

drunken clams in beer and Shaoxing wine—from Taiwanese-born chef Jowett Yu. Is this the next Duddell’s? Tucked in the basement of Central’s Standard Chartered Bank Building, Mott 32 has earned raves for its chic, low-lit dining room designed by Joyce Wang and well-executed dim sum like black cod and snow pea sprout dumplings, as well as crispy Peking duck and a knockout char siu (made with jamón Ibérico, no less). From the team behind the ragingly popular yakitori joint Yardbird, the refined izakaya Rōnin seats just 14 at a gleaming keyaki-wood counter. Chef Matt Abergel (a native of Calgary, of all places) comes up with thrilling riffs on sushi-grade fish—sardines with pickled tomato and eggplant; saba mackerel with fresh persimmon—and Japanese bar food like braised Kagoshima beef with maitake mushrooms, topped with an egg yolk. That and a wall lined with obscure Japanese whiskeys should keep you very happy for the night.It’s been 30 years since Jon Rowley first persuaded a few salmon fishermen on Alaska’s Copper River that they might be able to do something with their superb fish other than sell it to the cannery.

But even he never guessed things would get this crazy.Today, Copper River salmon is a smash hit. And at the root of this success are a couple of big ideas, one that seems obvious today -- getting the best fish and handling them carefully -- and one that is still a bit wacky -- a race to see which restaurant could serve the first Copper River king salmon of the season As the Copper River season begins Wednesday, these fish will be one of the few name-dropped on menus. And the first fresh Copper River salmon of the season could fetch as much as $50 a pound. But 30 years ago, almost none of the fish was even sold fresh.  When food marketing guru Jon Rowley offered the fishermen $3.50 a pound, they were overjoyed. RECIPES: Nine great salmon recipesRowley, who was consulting with Seattle-area restaurants about fish, learned about the salmon from Seattle smokehouse owner Erling Nilson, who was buying the fish frozen. When Rowley investigated further, he found that not only was the fish superb, but also the port was less than a mile from an airport, which would allow quick shipping."

They had the airport, they had a name you just couldn’t improve on, and they had the first major run of fresh salmon from the Northwest," Rowley says.But even more importantly, these fish were genetically a cut above."The fish have these superior genetics, they just put on a lot of oil," he said. "Copper River is not a long river — it’s only 300 miles or so — but there are some really tumultuous rapids. The fish develop this oil so they can power up through there. sushi making kit sainsburysThat’s what makes good eating."ninja sushi menu auburn caThey had all of these advantages, but nobody was marketing the fish fresh, it was all going to canning."sushi grade fish southamptonOf course, there was more to creating the Copper River craze than just slapping a fancy tag on a fat fillet.

First, Rowley had to teach the fishermen how to take care of their catch."You know when I first talked to a small group of fishermen to try to get some interest in going to fresh market," Rowley says, "they said there was just no way they could do it."High-quality fish requires special handling — they need to be caught alive, bled immediately and iced before rigor mortis can set in. The canning boats weren’t set up for the amount of work that was required.But one fisherman took the bait."About a month out from the season opening," he said, "a fisherman named Tommy Johnson said he was ready to give it a try. I basically had to educate him how to do all this stuff — just basic things like not letting the fish die in the nets."I told Tommy that when the fish come into the restaurant, they needed to have that immediate perception of value. They had to have that kind of luminous quality, so when they open the box, they say, 'Wow, look at that fish!' "Rowley personally delivered hundreds of pounds of the fresh fish to some restaurant clients in the Seattle area."

I brought down 400 pounds and delivered it myself to each restaurant," he says. "I spent some time in each kitchen showing them the fish and telling the story. We’d cut some fillets and when you run your hand down the side it would be coated with this beautiful orange salmon oil. Then the fish went out into the restaurant and right away waiters were coming back saying their customers told them it was the best salmon they’d ever eaten."To top it off, Rowley came up with a crazy marketing trick: He started a race to see which restaurant could serve the first Copper River king salmon of the season, a tradition that continues."At first, I was the only one in the race but nobody knew that," Rowley said."I’d pick up the salmon from the boat and send out these regular dispatches. And we’d have TV crews, radio reporters, everybody, would come out and cover the arrival of the first Copper River king salmon."Every year it got to be more important. One year President Clinton was in town speaking and there were more TV cameras at the airport covering the first salmon arriving than were covering the president."