How to Order at the Sushi Bar
Tips for Getting the Best Sushi at a Japanese Restaurant
If you want to get the best sushi, it helps to know how to order at a sushi bar and what the basic Japanese sushi terms mean. Use these guidelines as your starting point.
Absolutely fresh raw fish—artfully cut into bite-sized pieces that highlight its color, flavor, and texture, and then served on its own as sashimi or combined with a small cylinder of cold seasoned rice as sushi—is one of the definitive experiences in Japanese dining. But few non-Japanese know how to get the best out of their local sushi restaurant.
Don’t succumb to the Western habit of ordering a platter of assorted sushi, all brought to your table at once. Instead, follow some simple dining guidelines.
Tips for Eating Sushi Like an Expert
- Head for the bar. For the most authentic, highest-quality experience, sit at the sushi bar rather than at a table.
- Talk to the sushi chef. Communicate directly with him (or, in rare cases, her). Ask what is best today, and start by requesting whatever mild white fish he recommends.
- Order one at a time. Order each new item only after you’ve finished the previous one. Eating sushi and sashimi is a logical progression of artful tastes, not a buffet for grazing.
- Eat piece by piece. Eat each piece of sushi in a single bite: That’s the way the chef designs it to highlight the particular fish’s color, texture, and taste.
- Use wasabi correctly. Don’t dissolve the fiery green horseradish paste called wasabi in your little bowl of soy sauce for dipping, a move that overamplifies its flavor; instead, dab a little wasabi paste onto your food with the tip of a chopstick.
- Go easy on the ginger. Eat the thinly sliced gari, pink pickled sushi ginger, only to cleanse your palate between bites, not as a condiment for the sushi or sashimi.
- Know your sushi terminology. A good sushi bar will offer many choices on any given day, always varying with what’s in the market. Use the following as a guide to some of the basic choices; but always strike up a chat with your sushi chef to learn more!
Basic Sushi Types—A Glossary
- Aburage. Chewy little brown pouches of tofu (bean curd) skin that have been boiled in sweet sake and soy sauce before filling with rice balls.
- Aji. Spanish mackerel.
- Ama-ebi. Sweet (meaning raw) shrimp.
- Anago. Cooked saltwater conger eel.
- Chirashi sushi. A bed of sushi rice topped with sashimi or other ingredients.
- Ebi. Cooked shrimp.
- Fugu. Blowfish. A delicacy in Japan, this requires strict licensing by chefs who prepare it, as the fish’s liver contains a neurotoxin that adds a thrilling tingle to the tongue when traces of it are present, but can be deadly if improperly prepared—a danger that led to near-fatal consequences for Homer in the episode of The Simpsons entitled “One Fish, Two Fish, Blowfish, Blue Fish.”
- Futomaki. A large seaweed-wrapped roll, often containing an assortment of colorful Japanese pickles plus slices of tamago.
- Hamachi. Yellowtail.
- Hirame. Halibut.
- Ika. Squid.
- Ikura. Big pearly orange-pink beads of salmon roe.
- Maguro. Tuna.
- Mirugai. Long-necked clam.
- Nigiri Sushi. Your basic sushi, consisting of sliced fish on an oblong of seasoned sticky rice.
- Norimaki. Sushi rolls, made by enclosing sticky rice and fish or some other filling in a wrapper of nori, dried seaweed. Popular choices include cucumber, pickled radish, spicy tuna, spicy yellowtail, larger rolls known as futomaki or tazuna sushi, and such Westernized combos as the Philadelphia roll (smoked salmon and cream cheese) and the California roll (tuna and avocado). After rolling, norimaki are cut crosswise into bite-sized slices.
- Onigiri. Big bite-sized balls of steamed rice containing assorted stuffings.
- Otoro. Extra-rich fatty tuna.
- Saba. Mackerel.
- Sake. Salmon.
- Shiro maguro. Albacore tuna, often served slightly seared on the outside but still raw in the middle.
- Tai. Sea bream.
- Tamago. Slices of cold, slightly sweet rolled omelet, served on sushi rice or plain, sashimi-style.
- Tazuna sushi. Rainbow roll, a form of norimaki filled with multiple colors and flavors of raw fish.
- Temaki. Cone-shaped hand rolls, similar in ingredients to norimaki but served in single pieces resembling miniature ice cream cones.
- Tobiko. Flying fish roe, tiny pink eggs that add a sweet flavor and pleasantly grainy texture.
- Toro. Fatty tuna.
- Unagi. Cooked freshwater eel.
- Uni. Sea urchin roe, in clusters resembling small tongues the color of brown mustard, usually served atop an oblong of rice and wrapped in a collar of nori, dried seaweed. An acquired taste, it puts off many people with by its sometimes funky aroma and flavor. But the best sushi restaurants get absolutely fresh uni that has a bracing, sweet ocean flavor with hints of brine, nuts, and iodine.
Yes, it's a long list, and you'll find even more varieties at your local sushi restaurant. Don't try to master it all at once, though. Learn about sushi at a pace you feel comfortable with, and you'll eventually become an expert.
The copyright of the article How to Order at the Sushi Bar in Japanese Food is owned by Norman Kolpas. Permission to republish How to Order at the Sushi Bar must be granted by the author in writing.
