<p>I admit it. My kids eat more sushi than I and are more knowledgeable than I. Educate me!!
I have only had it a couple of times and I have no idea really what it is - is it always fish? or what the ginger stuff is for??? how to tell good sushi from bad???</p>
<p>Give me your best sushi knowledge and preferences!</p>
<p>Aji is the best. But not every sushi place will have it. Make sure you ask for the fried bones (you need to order two orders, 4 pieces to get the bones). You’ll never taste a better salty food. It’s amazing. Aji is Spanish mackerel, btw. Sit at the sushi bar and let the sushi chef surprise you–ask him to pick for you. Often they’ll invent something just for you. If you see someone eating something that looks interesting, ask to eat the same thing. Also, don’t be shy about asking other people who sit at the sushi bar–what do they recommend. We’ve made some good friends at our neighborhood sushi place just by discussing the food. Once you get used to it, sushi may become your favorite!</p>
<p>I would second the recommendation to sit at the sushi bar–right in front of the chef. In my experience, the chef is always willing to make recommendations and give you various options. Also, he can tell you about the different types of fish. You’ll get more attention sitting there, especially if you go at a time when the restaurant isn’t crowded and you’re the only person at the sushi bar. My H and I never sit at a table, we’ll always sit at the sushi bar and not even order off the menu. We just ask the chef to give us his best sushi.</p>
<p>The ginger is a palate cleanser. Sashimi is just raw fish, while nigiri</p>
<p>Is sashimi with rice. Lol iPhone fail.</p>
<p>Sushi means vinegared rice. The sushi rice they use is flavored with vinegar, sugar and salt. Fish, especially raw fish, is the most common topping/filling, but there are many vegetarian options as well. The two main forms are nigiri sushi (little sandwiches with the fish on top) and maki sushi (rolls of rice and a sheet of dried seaweed wrapped around the filling and sliced). </p>
<p>I’m a big sushi fan, but aji or any other form of mackerel would NOT be my recommendation for a novice! It has the strongest “fishy” smell and flavor of any fish.</p>
<p>If you enjoy teriyaki flavors, unagi or eel may be a good choice – it is served grilled, with a sweet/salty sauce. Other good, simple choices to try early on are kappa maki (cucumber), tamago (sweet omelet), ebi (whole cooked shrimp), sake (raw salmon, which is similar to lox), or California roll (cooked crabmeat, real or fake, with avocado).</p>
<p>Many sushi bars offer modern variations such as putting tempura (deep-fried ingredients) inside the rolls. </p>
<p>The ginger on the side is meant to be a palate cleanser in between bites, but some Americans enjoy putting it on top of the sushi and eating it together. The sushi police will not come get you if you do this. :)</p>
<p>Also: it is ok to pick up sushi with your fingers! It is commonly done in Japan. No reason to struggle with the chopsticks if you don’t want to.</p>
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<p>Except that your fingers will smell like fish for while - even after washing them.</p>
<p>In addtion to Hanna’s advice, I would add that other mild raw fish sushi pieces that are good for relative beginners are hamachi (yellow tail) and maguro (tuna).</p>
<p>Ugh I hate ahi! I won’t repeats Hanna’s list of what’s easy for beginners to eat. I like the eel (unagi) which usually comes with a sweetish sauce. A beginner might prefer the rolls where the fish sits on top of the rice to the ones rolled up with seaweed leaves. You should definitely sit at the bar and you should try some things outside your comfort range. The little pile of green paste by the way is wasabi - a horseradish paste - it’s quite spicy. You can put a bit between the fish and the rice or mix some in your soy sauce if you like. Generally you dip the sushi in some soy sauce before popping it in your mouth.</p>
<p>Nasty, nasty, nasty, nasty. That is my knowledge of sushi.</p>
<p>And there’s some sushi with no fish at all! Inari sushi are sweet little fried tofu pouches filled with the vinegared rice. Some folks call this football sushi (I think because of the appearance, but it’s also a good tailgate food.)
My favorite is futomaki, a seaweed wrapped roll of rice surrounding assorted pickled vegetables.</p>
<p>Was it Ogden Nash that wrote</p>
<p>"I prefer
My fish fried,
That way I know
My fish died. "</p>
<p>:D</p>
<p>I won’t eat raw seafood, but I like sushi very much. I have no trouble finding a good selection of cooked seafood or vegetable options.</p>
<p>The key to good sushi, in my opinion, is freshly cooked rice. The sushi sold in packages in the supermarket can be awful if it’s been there for more than an hour or so because the rice starts to dry out, and if the rice isn’t good, the sushi isn’t good.</p>
<p>I like my sushi cold. Glad for the info about the vinegar flavor on the rice. I once decided to be economical and put soy sauce packets on my leftover rice and heat it in the microwave. Yuk! Do not do that!</p>
<p>I will not eat raw fish, but love any kind of crabmeat.</p>
<p>I don’t know if this is available in other parts of the country, but here in Louisiana, we have a Cajun roll sushi. It is spicy crawfish. Very good, and it will clean out your nasal passages.</p>
<p>Another sushi delicacy we get to enjoy is tempura soft shell crab sushi.</p>
<p>Jealous?</p>
<p>Sushi at the supermarket? Or at Costco? Ick, ick, ick. Just say no.</p>
<p>My husband and I eat sushi several times a month. He’d go more often if I didn’t insist that occasionally we eat something else. I’m not a huge fan of raw fish–too aware of the dangers of fish flukes–but I find there are a lot of things I really like. The basic California Roll–crab, avocado, rice, and seaweed–is cooked and tasty. Shrimp tempura roll, ditto. I have developed a fondness, over the years for spicy tuna roll, as well.</p>
<p>Most sushi restaurants serve rolls, hand rolls, nigiri, and sashimi. I think the rolls are the “friendliest” for the inexperienced. Nigiri are the fish (or whatever) on the rice; sashimi is just the fish (or whatever). </p>
<p>When I took my 77-year-old older sister to sushi–she’d never had it before–she enjoyed the California roll, the miso soup, and a vegetarian roll. She tried the nigiri salmon, but only one bite… And she really liked the mochi ice cream!</p>
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<p>We were in Japan for 2 weeks last summer. They sold sushi everywhere - grocery stores, train stations, convenience stores, vending machines.</p>
<p>Actually, our Whole Foods has great sushi. They will make it for you fresh. It’s only so-so at other grocery stores. I often make it at home - very easy to do except I have a hard time getting my rolls as small as professionals do.</p>
<p>Sushi is an umbrella term for seafood with rice.</p>
<p>Sushi is seafood served on a small bed of rice.</p>
<p>Sashimi is the same seafood without the rice</p>
<p>Rolls are seafood wrapped in rice. (California rolls contain no seafood at all)</p>
<p>A popular misnomer is that all sushi is raw. Not True. All shrimp, crab, eel and octopus served in the sushi manner are par cooked. These types often have their own section on the menu. They are call Non Raw Sushi and they are the only kind of sushi I enjoy.</p>
<p>carrying on the Gluten-free threads…most people aren’t aware, but the fake crabmeat/crab sticks found in most pedestrian California rolls contains gluten.</p>
<p>The best part of sushi is the wasabi mustard! Mix it in with your soy sauce and dip your sushi piece in it. Depending on how much wasabi you put in the soy sauce, you can really clear your sinuses.</p>
<p>My H has always been a big fan of sushi, it took me a LONG while to get the courage to try the raw stuff, which I now devour (!), but when I started I would get cooked sushi, like shrimp, crab stick (someone already mentioned the gluten alert here), and a sweet egg omelet tamago Hanna mentioned that I just love! You can get vegetable rolls too to try them out before you graduate to the raw stuff. Load the wasabi in the soy sauce (I always ask for low-soduim soy sauce)</p>
<p>I agree with others that you should stick to places where the sushi is made fresh on the premises. I guess I am lucky that I have Wegmans here where they make it, but I’d avoid most sushi pacakges in grocery stores…</p>
<p>“Sushi is an umbrella term for seafood with rice.”</p>
<p>No. “Su” means vinegar. Sushi is the vinegar-seasoned rice with <em>any</em> topping or other ingredient, including just seaweed or just a pickled plum. Seafood is not necessary. Vinegar is.</p>
<p>Japanese cuisine features a number of dishes that are seafood and rice that are not sushi. A bowl of unvinegared plain rice with seafood on top would be called domburi. Tekka-don (tuna) and una-don (eel) are common examples.</p>
<p>“California rolls contain no seafood at all”</p>
<p>That’s not true. If you’re talking about the California rolls made with surimi or imitation crabmeat, that’s made of pollock or other white fish. It is definitely seafood.</p>