By | Shital Kakkar Mehra | Executive Presence Coach for CEOs I Business Communication Expert I Best-selling Author I Co-Founder Katalyst, NGO
Sushi bars are extremely popular overseas and are now gaining ground in India. ‘Sushi’ refers to a Japanese dish made with cooked vinegare rice and raw or cooked fish/ sea food/ vegetables. Although used interchangeably with sushi, ‘sashimi’ is fresh thinly-sliced raw meat (fish is the most common meat).
Some tips when dining at a sushi bar:
- Traditionally, sushi is eaten in the “nigiri” style i.e. an oval mound of mildly sweet & tangy sticky rice topped with a thin slice of raw fish. “Maki” is fish/ vegetables rolled with rice in a seaweed sheet, cut into bite-sized roundels.
- While waiting for your sushi order, edamame (boiled soy beans) is served as munchies. Mild drinks like green tea, sake or miso soup are the best accompaniments with sushi.
- ‘Wasabi’ (a piquant paste) is a traditional accompaniment and is to be consumed in micro quantities as it can overpower your senses, ruining your meal in the bargain.
- Sweet pickled slices of ginger (‘gari’) are another traditional accompaniment served with sushi. Its mild flavor adds to the taste of sushi and is used to rinse the palate between different types of sushi.
- When dipping in the soy sauce, place the fish-side down as the rice is loosely-packed and tends to disintegrate. While eating, place the fish-side on your tongue, to relish the mild blend of flavors.
- Use your chopsticks for eating sushi and for dipping ginger in the soy sauce.
- Use the back of your chopsticks to transfer the sushi from the common platter to your plate.
Republished with permission and originally published at Shital Kakkar Mehra’s LinkedIn
