Thursday, December 11, 2008

Irashaimase!

In this post I would like to share with you guys one of my 'used to be' favourite food. Before I went to Japan, I always went to the Sushi King almost every fortnight just to have sushi. And when I had the opportunity staying in Japan, I didnt miss the chance to taste the sushi made by original Japanese people. he he..

I tried sushi almost every restaurant I visited and finally my instructor recommend a very best restaurant in Tokyo.

Maybe because I ate too much or I am getting bored of this dish, after visiting that restaurant, I stopped taking sushi.

Until now, I dont have any feeling of entering any restaurant selling sushi. Well, errr.. maybe for now.. I dont know.. But lets share some information about sushi. I gathered these informations through reading some websites in the internet.

SUSHI

Sushi is the most famous Japanese dish outside of Japan, and one of the most popular dishes among the Japanese themselves. All sushi has a base of specially prepared rice, and complemented with other ingredients.

Some popular ones are:

Nigiri
Small rice balls with fish, shellfish, etc. on top. There are countless varieties of nigirizushi, some of the most common ones being tuna, shrimp, eel, squid, octopus and fried egg.

Gunkan
Small cups made of sushi rice and dried seaweed filled with seafood, etc. There are countless varieties of gunkanzushi, some of the most common ones being sea urchin and various kinds of fish eggs.

Norimaki

Sushi rice and seafood, etc. rolled in dried seaweed sheets. There are countless varieties of sushi rolls differing in ingredients and thickness. Sushi rolls prepared "inside out" are very popular outside of Japan, but rarely found in Japan.

Temaki

Temakizushi (literally: hand rolls) are cones made of nori-seaweed and filled with sushi rice, seafood and vegetables.

Oshizushi


Oshizushi is pressed sushi, in which the fish is pressed onto the sushi rice in a wooden box. The picture shows trout oshizushi in form of a popular ekiben (train station lunch box).

Inari
Inarizushi is a simple and inexpensive type of sushi, in which sushi rice is filled into aburaage (deep fried tofu) bags.

Chirashi

Chirashizushi is a dish in which seafood, mushroom and vegetables are spread over sushi rice. It can resemble domburi with the difference being that chirashizushi uses sushi rice while domburi uses regular, unseasoned rice.


Sushi rice
Sushi is made with white, short-grained, Japanese rice mixed with a dressing made of rice vinegar, sugar, salt, and occasionally kombu & sake. It is usually cooled to room temperature before being used for a filling in a sushi. Sushi rice (sushi-meshi) is prepared with short-grain Japanese rice, which has a consistency that differs from long-grain strains such as those from Asian countries like Malaysia. The essential quality is its stickiness. Rice that is too sticky has a mushy texture; if not sticky enough, it feels dry. Freshly harvested rice (shinmai) typically has too much water, and requires extra time to drain the rice cooker after washing.
Nori
The seaweed wrappers used in maki and temaki are called nori. Nori is an alga, traditionally cultivated into the harbors of Japan. Originally, algae was scraped from dock pilings, rolled out into thin, edible sheets, and dried in the sun, in a process similar to making rice paper.
Nori by itself is an edible snack and is available with salt or flavored with teriyaki sauce. The flavored variety, however, tends to be of lesser quality and is not suitable for sushi.

Omelette
When making fukusazushi, a paper-thin omelet may replace a sheet of nori as the wrapping. The omelet is traditionally made on a rectangular omelet pan (makiyakinabe), and used to form the pouch for the rice and fillings.
Toppings and fillings

Fish
For culinary, sanitary, and aesthetic reasons, fish eaten raw must be fresher and of higher quality than fish which is cooked.
Professional sushi chefs are trained to recognize good fish. Important attributes include smells, colour, firmness, and being free of obvious parasites that normal commercial inspection do not detect (many go undetected).
Seafood
Other seafoods such as squid (ika), octopus (tako), shrimp (ebi and amaebi), clam (mirugai, aoyagi and akagi), fish roe (ikura, masago, kazunoko and tobiko), sea urchin (uni), crab (kani), and various kinds of shellfish (abalone, prawn, scallop) are the most popular seafoods in sushi. Oysters, however, are not typically put in sushi because the taste is not thought to go well with the rice.

Vegetables
Pickled daikon radish (takuan) in shinko maki, pickled vegetables (tsukemono), fermented soybeans (nattō) in nattō maki, avocado, cucumber in kappa maki, asparagus, yam, pickled ume (umeboshi), gourd (kanpyō), burdock (gobo), and sweet corn may be mixed with mayonnaise.
Red meat
Beef, ham, spam, sausage, and horse meat are often lightly cooked.

Other fillings
Tofu and eggs (in the form of slightly sweet, layered omelet called tamagoyaki and raw quail eggs ride as a gunkan-maki topping) are common.
Condiments
Shōyu
The common name for soy sauce. In sushi restaurants, it may also be referred to as murasaki (lit. "purple").
Wasabi
A piquant paste made from the grated root of the wasabi plant. Real wasabi (hon-wasabi) is Wasabi japonica. Hon-wasabi has anti-microbial properties and may reduce the risk of food poisoning. The traditional grating tool for wasabi is a sharkskin grater or samegawa oroshi.
An imitation wasabi (seiyo-wasabi), made from horseradish and mustard powder and dyed green is common. It is found at lower-end kaiten zushi restaurants, in bento box sushi and at most restaurants outside of Japan. If it is manufactured in Japan, it may be labelled "Japanese Horseradish".
In sushi restaurants, wasabi may be referred to as namida ("tears").
Gari
Sweet, pickled ginger. Eaten to both cleanse the palate as well as to aid in the digestive process.
Ocha
In Japan, green tea (ocha) is invariably served together with sushi. Better sushi restaurants often use a distinctive premium tea known as mecha. In sushi vocabulary, green tea is known as agari.
Nutritional information
The main ingredients of sushi, raw fish and rice are naturally low in fat (with the exception of some rolls, especially Western style rolls), high in protein, carbohydrates, vitamins, and minerals.
Specifically:
Fats: Most seafood are naturally low in fat; and what fat is found in them is generally rich in unsaturated fat Omega-3. Since sushi is often served raw, no fat is introduced in its preparation.
Proteins: Fish, tofu, seafood, egg, and many other sushi fillings contain high levels of protein.
Vitamins and Minerals: These are found in many of the vegetables used for sushi. For example, the gari and nori used to make sushi are both rich in nutrients. Other vegetables wrapped within the sushi also offer various degrees of nutritional value.
Carbohydrates: These are found in the rice and the vegetables.
Health risks
Some fish such as tuna, especially bluefin, can carry high levels of mercury and can be hazardous when consumed in large quantities
Consuming raw or undercooked seafood presents the risk of anisakiasis. Uncooked seafood also often carries the bacterium Vibrio parahaemolyticus, which can cause diarrhea. Also, sushi carries the risk of transmitting parasitic infection and other pathogens. In addition, some forms of sushi, notably puffer fugu, can cause severe poisoning if not prepared properly. Sushi is usually eaten with salty condiments such as soy sauce, which are added by the diner in whatever quantity is desired. Those with hypertension or renal disorders must take care not to eat too much salt inadvertently by overusing such condiments.
Presentation
In Japan, and increasingly abroad, conveyor belt sushi/sushi train (kaiten zushi) restaurants are a popular, cost effective way of eating sushi. At these restaurants, the sushi is served on color-coded plates, with each color denoting the cost of the sushi serving. The plates are placed on a conveyor belt or boats floating in a moat. As the belt or boat passes, the customers choose their desired plates. After finishing, the bill is tallied by counting how many plates of each color have been taken. Some kaiten sushi restaurants in Japan operate on a fixed price system, with each plate, consisting usually of two pieces of sushi, generally costing between ¥100 and ¥200.
More traditionally, sushi is served on minimalist Japanese-style, geometric, wood or lacquer plates which are mono- or duo-tone in color, in keeping with the aesthetic qualities of this cuisine. Many small sushi restaurants actually use no plates — the sushi is eaten directly off of the wooden counter, usually with one's hands.
Etiquette
Sushi can be eaten either by hand or using chopsticks, although traditionally nigiri is eaten with the fingers because the rice is packed loosely so as to fall apart in one's mouth, and would disintegrate on chopsticks. Condiments (soy sauce, wasabi, and pickled ginger) are used as desired, though one connoisseur counsels, "adding wasabi to soy sauce is a disaster. It reduces the spiciness dramatically and masks the taste of the fish.

3 comments:

Permata Nusantara said...

holaaa...lets go to japan...

Wafa said...

Mintak resepi leh..

lazynana said...

Hi, I fount it very interesting to read your post. You liked Sushi alreay...before you stayed in Japan. Well, my recent participant (she was a moslem from Tanzania) loved it too.
Bon Appetit!