March 9, 2009
How to Eat Nigiri Sushi
Sushi platter, Ko, Intercontinental Hotel, Singapore
Here are some tips I learnt about eating nigiri sushi after reading the book The Zen of Fish. Nigiri sushi are those sushi with a slice of fish, squid, or perhaps egg placed on top of a small slab of rice.
1. Do not mix wasabi into your soy sauce and apply it indiscriminately - in Japan, sushi chefs would probably have put a little wasabi inside a nigiri, using a larger dab with fatty fish and a smaller one with lean fish. Extra wasabi is never served on the side.
2. Pickled ginger is not supposed to be gobbled down as an appetiser. Those slices of ginger are meant to cleanse the palate between servings of different kinds of fish so that you don't mix their flavours on your tongue.
3. Do not dip the rice side of your nigiri in the soy sauce. You should be dipping the fish side.
4. Eat your nigiri in one bite. Not two.
5. Use your fingers to pick up sushi - that's what most Japanese do.
Posted by DSD at March 9, 2009 9:03 AM
Action pics please!
So, why do they put the wasabi on the side?
jase
I know that those are the rules of eating nigiri sushi but I also know that most Singaporeans break ALL those rules! I wonder what the Japanese think when they see us eat nigiri sushi. Must be shaking their heads in horror.
i oways notice tis 'antic' at buffets or even high-class restaurants...i noe its a bit shameful to eat wif tos ignorant Sporeans who jus mix wasabi wif e soy sauce n make e tiny plate so er xin.. =S haha...even eatin their style of eating soba is so weird lo...i duno where dey learn from..kaos.. =x
my hats off to u first for this fun blog!
I'm guilty of doing practically everything u've mentioned!! They taste just as good tho. ok the next time I eat them, I'll try to bear in mind the golden rules...
though i read from a Japanese blogger, the REAL way to pick up a sushi is with chopsticks, not hand. and he admits that most sushi tend to break up when u reverse (when using chopsticks) the sushi to dip the fish part into the soya sauce.
one less then "proper" way to prevent that from happening is to pick up a piece of ginger (with chopsticks) and use it as a "brush" to brush on a light layer of soya sauce on the fish so the entire thing doesn't break up, but the to the really anal chef, even that is unacceptable form.
so i guess it depends how anal one is on the "rules" of sushi eating, and the establishment one goes to.