Learn About Raw And Cooked Sushi Ingredients

The thought of sampling sushi ingredients can be quite daunting to someone unfamiliar with it. To most, sushi equates raw fish, but that is a misconception. Not all sushi is raw.

One sushi enthusiast however recommends a slow strategy of gradually introducing the different tastes to your palate. A good start for someone who is a little reluctant may be a vegetarian sushi such as cucumber maki, which in traditional Japanese, you would be calling Kappa Maki or avocado maki, an innovation of the West. This will simply be a rice roll, with a refreshing cucumber or avocado filling sealed with a thin layer of seaweed or nori.

Other vegetables incorporated into sushi include carrots, radish, tofu, pickled plum or a variety of pickled vegetables. Ginger and wasabi are also used, but as condiments. Try California Roll, which will contain either crabmeat or imitation crabmeat, neither of which is served raw. Grilled eel, tomago, which is cooked egg or tempura, which can be anything deep-fried in batter, might also be good choices for trainee sushi eaters. Philadelphia roll has a filling of cream cheese, cucumber and smoked salmon, which will gradually get you used to eating your fish rarer.

If you have not tried sushi before, opt for restaurant sushi over the pre-packaged variant you can buy in a supermarket. Since freshness is so important in seafood and fish used for sushi, what you use may depend on what is readily available seasonally or regionally.

Any type of tuna can be used in sushi. That includes species like bluefin, yellowtail, skipjack and albacore. Salmon is probably one of the most popular choices. It can be used smoked or raw, but the recommendation is that it should be frozen for some time before use. Some considers salmon skin a delicacy. Yellowtail, halibut and mackerel are also favorites. Squid can be flash-cooked and eel or unagi is grilled. Sea bass, snapper and mackerel should be processed in some way, usually with vinegar, before being employed in sushi.

Although the Japanese have in the past regarded freshwater fish such as trout and sturgeon as unsuitable, the catches of fish farms as found in Norway, New Zeeland, Canada, Britain and Japan are now regarded as safe for use.

Since any raw animal product, and that includes fish, can be a source of parasites, it is recommended that most fish should be frozen before use. Fish types like cod, hake and haddock are frequently infested, which is why they do not often appear on the sushi platter.

In Japan, one of the true challenges lies in eating fugu or blowfish in sushi. As this fish is highly toxic, a chef needs to be government licensed to be allowed to prepare it. You are however unlikely to consider this, when choosing your own sushi ingredients.

By: Alan Stables

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Alan Stables is a fan of sushi. Sometimes he likes to buy all the sushi ingredients himself to make his speciality, a fish sushi . His favorite is salmon sushi.