Sushi
portioned prepared vinegared rice topped or rolled with other ingredients / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Sushi (寿司, すし, 鮨, or 鮓) is a traditional food that is from Japan.
The word "Sushi" comes from the Japanese word "Su" (酢) meaning vinegar, and "Meshi" (飯), meaning rice.
Sushi is made with specially prepared rice, called sumeshi (酢飯). The rice is mixed with vinegar, salt, and sugar. Sushi is known for having raw or cooked seafood in it, but it sometimes has non-fish foods such as vegetables. Some sushi is wrapped in a sheet of seaweed called nori (海苔).
Soy sauce and wasabi are commonly eaten with sushi, which is traditionally eaten by hand, but eating it using chopsticks is still accepted. Gari (sweet, pickled ginger) can often be found alongside a plate of sushi and also a little bit of wasabi, used as a palate cleanser, but it must be eaten with chopsticks.
There are many different kinds of sushi. The most common sushi in Japan is nigirizushi (握り寿司): fish meat that is placed on top of a small portion of sumeshi. Sometimes you may find other ingredients on top of the sumeshi, such as roe (fish eggs), and sea urchin meat, instead of fish. Another type of sushi, makizushi (巻き寿司), consists of sumeshi rolled around fish and/or vegetables. In the US, makizushi is more popular than nigirizushi. Another type is known as temaki (手巻き) or a hand roll. This kind of sushi comes in a cone-shape, created by the nori wrapped around the ingredients inside. They are usually filled with a mixture of sumeshi, fish, and vegetables.
In Japan, sushi is sometimes sold in "conveyor-belt shops" called kaiten zushi (回転寿司), where plates of sushi are put on a moving belt that passes by the customers. People freely take the sushi they want as it passes. The color of the plate shows the price of the sushi. This way of serving sushi is becoming more popular in other countries as well.