She’s in her twenties, a mother, an artist and Ebisu’s first female Sushi Chef.

Rika was born in Japan and lived in a seaside community where the local fisherman came door to door to sell their catch and her family, mother, father and two sisters would have sashimi for dinner.

Ebisu is one of Japan’s Seven Lucky God’s, the God of fisherman and good fortune.

I have the good fortune to have Rika as my Sushi Chef on a weekday lunch or a Wednesday evening, when she works a double shift.

I wonder if there are challenges to being the first female Sushi Chef.

“It’s hard. There’s lots of physical labor. You have to pick up a 30lb fish- I’m feeling buffed these days. You cut all the fish and do the prep work.”

I learn that there is an art to ensure that the sushi rice is cooked and prepared properly.

“First you cook the rice, mix in the vinegar, sugar, salt and seaweed. This brings out the flavor. You let it cool. The rice can’t be too hot or too cold, or too hard. Making the rice is the first thing I learned and one of the most important ingredients of good sushi.”

Rika has a great deal of knowledge regarding the origin of the fish she prepares. She tastes. She knows the various sauces, the flavors and presentation. This is where Rika’s artistic background is displayed. On her own, she paints in acrylic on canvas and wood. At Ebisu, whether it’s a hand roll, a medley of sashimi or the intricacy of a sliver of cucumber or a flowering radish, Rika brings her beauty and art to my plate in an intimate exchange.

I ask about Toro, fatty tuna.

“You need to have it very fresh, because of the fat, it oxidizes quickly.”

This is how Rika had toro as a little girl not far from Tokyo.

One afternoon, I asked Rika to introduce me to something new. I tend to order tuna, salmon and eel repeatedly.

“How about escolar? It’s a butter fish from Hawaii.”

It melts.

Another suggestion.

“Walu-super white tuna.”

This isn’t the Bumblebee of my youth.

And then a local striped bass.

Succulent.

Rika’s family came to the United States when she was four; her father was an executive for Hitachi. When Rika was thirteen, her father passed away from kidney cancer at forty-six. Rika’s mother brought her three daughters back to Japan.

I want to know what that was like. She tells me how hard that time was. I know what it’s like to lose your father as a teenager.

And there must have been culture shock.

“Yeah. I was a rocker with pink hair.”

At nineteen, Rika returned to America to attend San Francisco State University. She initially wanted to study French, but later changed to Art, and then took another detour and became the mother of her now, four year old son, Sho. Her mother remains in Japan, but was here for the birth of her grandson. Rika’s oldest sister lives in this neighborhood, the Inner Sunset, and her younger sister lives in Santa Cruz.

She supported herself waitressing in a few different restaurants and then Ebisu. And after a year, she approached Ebisu owner, Steve Fujii. She wanted to become a Chef, and with a small child, she knew Culinary School was not one of her options. She asked Steve for the opportunity.

“I’ve been very lucky. He has a son my age, and he treats me like a daughter.”

 She has shed some quiet tears. There are times, that she feels customer’s doubt her, because she is a woman, and because she is young. On more than one occasion she has heard,

“You can’t make my sushi. I want him to make it.”

She reflects.

“I’m glad I came this far and I’ve stuck with it.”

She likes the neighborhood and she has regular customers that work at the DeYoung Museum and some gardeners from Golden Gate Park.

“They’re friendly and remember my name.”

The translation for Rika, Ri= parent’s home, and Ka= perfume, and combined it translates to scent of home. It’s important to Rika that her customers know that she is Japanese. She brings a scent of her home to us and I want to sit in front of Rika at her section of Ebisu’s sushi bar.

NEXT WEEK: MEET JOE BLAIR, OWNER, PROGRESS HARDWARE