This is an accepted version of this page Sushi (すし, 寿司, 鮨, 鮓, pronounced [sɯɕiꜜ] or [sɯꜜɕi] ⓘ) is a traditional Japanese dish made with vinegared rice (鮨飯, sushi-meshi), typically seasoned with sugar and salt, and combined with a variety of ingredients (ねた, neta), such as seafood, vegetables, or meat: raw seafood is the most common, although some may be cooked.

While sushi comes in numerous styles and presentation, the defining component is the vinegared rice, also known as shari (しゃり), or sumeshi (酢飯).

[1] The modern form of sushi is believed to have been created by Hanaya Yohei, who invented nigiri-zushi, the most commonly recognized type today, in which seafood is placed on hand-pressed vinegared rice.

[7] The first mention of a narezushi-like food is in a Chinese dictionary thought to be from the 4th century, in this instance referring to salted fish that had been placed in cooked or steamed rice, which caused it to undergo a fermentation process via lactic acid.

[8][9] Fermentation methods following similar logic in other Asian rice cultures include burong isda, balao-balao, and tinapayan of the Philippines; pekasam of Indonesia and Malaysia, pla ra (ปลาร้า) of Thailand; sikhae (식해) of Korea; and Mắm bò hóc or cá chua of Vietnam.

Pickling was a way to preserve the excess fish and guarantee food for the following months, and narezushi became an important source of protein for Japanese consumers.

[15] In the Yōrō Code (養老律令, Yōrō-ritsuryō) of 718, the characters for "鮨" and "鮓" are written as a tribute to the Japanese imperial court, and although there are various theories as to what exactly this food was, it is possible that it referred to narezushi.

[7] Today's style of nigirizushi (握り寿司, "hand-pressed sushi"), consisting of an oblong mound of rice with a slice of fish draped over it, became popular in Edo (contemporary Tokyo) in the 1820s or 1830s.

Chirashizushi (ちらし寿司, "scattered sushi", also referred to as barazushi) serves the rice in a bowl and tops it with a variety of raw fish and vegetable garnishes.

[citation needed] Cone sushi is a variant of inarizushi originating in Hawaii that may include green beans, carrots, gobo, or poke along with rice, wrapped in a triangular abura-age piece.

Gunkanmaki (軍艦巻, "Warship roll") (ja:軍艦巻) is a special type of nigirizushi: an oval, hand-formed clump of sushi rice that has a strip of nori wrapped around its perimeter to form a vessel that is filled with some soft, loose or fine-chopped ingredient that requires the confinement of nori such as roe, nattō, oysters, uni (sea urchin roe), sweetcorn with mayonnaise, scallops, and quail eggs.

The chef lines the bottom of the oshibako with the toppings, covers them with sushi rice, and then presses the mold's lid to create a compact, rectilinear block.

[63] Less than a month later an Associated Press story credited a Los Angeles chef named Ken Seusa at the Kin Jo sushi restaurant near Hollywood as its inventor.

According to Tojo, he single-handedly created the California roll at his Vancouver restaurant, including all the modern ingredients of cucumber, cooked crab, and avocado.

[71] The common theme in origin stories is that surrounding the roll in rice made it more appealing to western consumers who had never eaten traditional sushi.

[74] Multiple-filling rolls inspired by futomaki are a more popular type of sushi within the United States and come in variations that take their names from their places of origin.

Though the menu names of dishes often vary by restaurant, some examples include the following: Australian sushi is a thick hand roll made from half a standard sheet of nori.

People accused the owner of cultural appropriation and left negative reviews,[100][101] prompting to Google to remove all spam ratings from the restaurant location.

[107] It consists of gim (the Korean version of nori) rolled around rice seasoned with sesame oil, instead of vinegar, and a variety of ingredients such as vegetables, like danmuji, and meat, like bulgogi.

Originally, algae was scraped from dock pilings, rolled out into thin, edible sheets, and dried in the sun, similar to making rice paper.

Sushi chefs are trained to recognize important attributes, including smell, color, firmness, and freedom from parasites that may go undetected in a commercial inspection.

Commonly used fish are tuna (maguro, shiro-maguro), Japanese amberjack, yellowtail (hamachi), snapper (kurodai), mackerel (saba), and salmon (sake).

[111] Other seafoods such as squid (ika), eel (anago and unagi), pike conger (hamo), octopus (tako), shrimp (ebi and amaebi), clam (mirugai, aoyagi and akagai), fish roe (ikura, masago, kazunoko and tobiko), sea urchin (uni), crab (kani), and various kinds of shellfish (abalone, prawn, scallop) are the most popular seafoods in sushi.

Sushi may be dipped in shōyu (soy sauce), and is usually flavored with wasabi, a piquant paste made from the grated stem of the Wasabia japonica plant.

In store-sold or to-go packages of sushi, the plastic leaf strips are often used to prevent the rolls from coming into early or unwanted contact with the ginger and wasabi included with the dish.

[120] A 2021 study in Catalonia, Spain reported that the estimated exposure to methylmercury in sushi consumption by adolescents exceeded the tolerable daily intake.

[122] Such an infection can be dangerous for expecting mothers due to the health risks that medical interventions or treatment measures may pose on the developing fetus.

Traditionally, sushi is served on minimalist Japanese-style, geometric, mono- or duo-tone wood or lacquer plates, keeping with this cuisine's aesthetic qualities.

Newer kaiten zushi restaurants use barcodes or RFID tags embedded in the dishes to manage elapsed time after the item was prepared.

Traditional etiquette suggests that the sushi is turned over so that only the topping is dipped to flavor it; the rice—which has already been seasoned with rice wine vinegar, sugar, salt, mirin, and kombu—would otherwise absorb too much soy sauce and would fall apart.