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For sushi lovers: Five interesting facts you should know
If you’re a fan of sushi, then you will love these fun facts about the food.
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Sushi has become a trend everywhere from the city of Jakarta to the eastern regions of Indonesia, like Lombok. (Shutterstock/-)
N
ot long ago eating raw fish was considered unusual, but now sushi has become a trend everywhere, from the metropolitan city of Jakarta to the eastern regions of Indonesia, like Lombok. The food is also loved by all ages, from children to adults.
If you’re a fan of sushi, then you will love these fun facts about the food.
Sushi and cheese similarity
Cheese is charming and lovable, even though some of its types have a strong smell. In Indonesia, cheese is so much softer and not as strong as the matured cheese that is very famous in Europe. Apparently, the original sushi has the same character as cheese.
Let's go back to the times before refrigerators existed; there was a meal that served as a solution to store raw fish for a longer time. The Japanese chopped the fish into pieces, put them into rice as a filling and then store the food in a container. Back in those day, people used to store fish for up to four years. Dubbed funazushi, this technique makes fish last longer by fermenting the rice. The fish smell will also get stronger and it will taste salty and sour, just like cheese.
(Read also: Must-try local foods served with cheese)
Sushi is not as healthy as you think
Served in little portions and mostly consisting of raw fish makes sushi looks like a tasty way to enjoy a healthy meal. People even turned to sushi as an alternative to dieting that allowed them to still eat deliciously. Brace yourself as the facts suggests otherwise: Sushi contains a high amount of calories. For instance, a portion of California Roll, which usually consists of crab, small portions of avocado and cucumber, contains about 300 calories. It's true that the rice portion looks small, but it's actually not as small as you think because it has been pushed tightly into small pieces.
Most sushi places in Jakarta usually fry their salmon skins or shrimp tempura. Combined with mayonnaise, these regular sushi portions could inject high amounts of calories. Maybe it's a good idea to order sushi with raw fish if you want to keep eating it safely on a regular basis.
You don't need chopsticks
In the original philosophy of sushi, feeling the sushi is not only a thing that you do with your mouth. Sushi texture can be recognized using bare hands. Sushi experts believe that you can feel the good and fresh quality of the fish by touching it.
Other things you should pay attention to in order to enjoy sushi in the right way is to limit the use of soy sauce. Wasabi should not be combined with soy sauce because the chef usually gives you the right amount of wasabi inside the sushi and doesn't expect you to ruin the original taste.
It takes a long time to become a sushi chef
Sushi is very popular around the world; this means you can get recipes for sushi from all over the internet, but if you want to be a sushi chef it's going to take at least five years to do the training. After the training, you will work as an assistant for a master sushi chef. Becoming a master sushi chef will take a long time, but mostly it only applies in Japan where the food originated. In the country, sushi is more than just cuisine, it has become a form of art. (kes)
