All Things Sushi

All Things Sushi — Part 3

July 31, 2018

Before we get to our post, we would like to remind everyone that we are hiring an experienced sushi chef (on the job training is available), as well as kitchen help and servers. Contact us to learn more or apply today!

In part 3 of our 4 part examination of the history of sushi from conception to modern representation, we will be looking at the introduction of sushi into Western culture. The following is taken from wikipedia.

Sushi and Western culture:
The Oxford English Dictionary notes the earliest written mention of sushi in an 1893 book, Japanese Interiors, where it mentions that "Domestics served us with tea and sushi or rice sandwiches".[20][21] However, there is also mention of sushi in a Japanese-English dictionary from 1873,[22] and an 1879 article on Japanese cookery in the journal Notes and Queries.[23] Additionally, the 1879 best-selling book A Tour Around the World by General Grant by James Dabney McCabe describes former president Ulysses S. Grant dining on the "shashimi" [sic] version of sushi during his visit to Japan.[24]

United States:
Sushi was already being served in the United States by the early 1900s, following an influx of Japanese immigration after the Meiji Restoration.[24] The first sushi shop in the U.S. reportedly opened in 1906 in the Little Tokyo neighborhood of Los Angeles.[25] H.D. Miller, food historian of Lipscomb University has written that a wave of Japanophilia in American high society resulted in the serving of sushi at social functions. Popularity of Japanese food peaked ca. 1905 when it was being served at Japanese-themed social gatherings across the United States, including in mid-western cities such as Minneapolis, Minnesota, St. Louis, Missouri and Bismarck, North Dakota.[24] According to Miller, the earliest published mention of sushi eaten by an American, in America, was an August 18, 1904 article in the Los Angeles Herald about a luncheon served in Santa Monica by the socialite Fern Dell Higgins.[24]

Several years later, a wave of anti-Japanese nativism sentiments and restrictions on Japanese immigration, starting with the Gentlemen's Agreement of 1907, caused a subsequent decline in the acceptance of Japanese cuisine.[24] After the outbreak of World War II, Japanese-American restaurants on the West Coast were generally forced to close and sell off their businesses due to internment orders on their proprietors.[26] One restaurant that reopened after the war to serve sushi was Matsuno Sushi (Matsu-no-sushi) in Little Tokyo, Los Angeles. This restaurant had been in business at least since 1938 or 1939,[27][28] and by 1949, it was back serving sushi (featuring local bluefin tuna[29]) for lunch. But the maki and inari they served was not shaped by hand by trained chefs, but molded in cookie-cutters.[30]

The Kawafuku restaurant in Little Tokyo has been credited with being the "first true sushi bar" in the United States,[31] that is to say, the first to serve sushi from a trained sushi chef in the country.[32][33] Some sources accept the claim made by a man named Noritoshi Kanai that he was the person instrumental in persuading Kawafuku's owner to start the sushi section. Kanai has also claimed to be the person who coined the term "sushi bar". Kanai headed the Tokyo-based arm of Mutual Trading, an importer of Japanese food ingredients that served Kawafuku and other restaurants.[34][33] The first sushi chef in America according to this account was Shigeo Saito, and some sources paint the chef as the principal figure who brought real sushi to the U.S.[31]

The California roll was invented in Los Angeles by substituting a slice of avocado for the seasonal toro (fatty tuna) in a traditional maki roll.[35]

United Kingdom:
A report of sushi being consumed in Britain occurred when the then Crown Prince Akihito (born 1933) visited Queen Elizabeth II at the time of her Coronation in May 1953.[36][37] In September 1953, Crown Prince Akihito served sushi at the Japanese Embassy in Washington, DC.[38]

Australia:
Australia is a major source of rice used in sushi, in particular Leeton, New South Wales, which is the headquarters of SunRice.[39][40] The first known sushi conveyor belt in Australia appeared in Queensland in 1993, when Sushi Train opened its first restaurant.[41]

Etymology:
The Japanese name "sushi" is written with kanji (Chinese characters) for ancient Chinese dishes which bear little resemblance to today's sushi.

One of these might have been a salt pickled fish. The first use of "鮨" appeared in the face and hand, the oldest Chinese dictionary believed to be written around the 3rd century BC. It is explained as literally "Those made with fish (are called) 鮨, those made with meat (are called) 醢". "醢" is a fermented meat made from salt and minced pork and "鮨" is a fermented fish made from salt and minced fish. The Chinese character "鮨" is believed to have a much earlier origin, but this is the earliest recorded instance of that character being associated with food. "鮨" was not associated with rice. In 2nd century AD, another character used to write "sushi", "鮓", appeared in another Chinese dictionary of Han dynasty: "鮓滓也以塩米醸之加葅熟而食之也", which translates as "鮓滓 is a food where fish is pickled by rice and salt, and itself is eaten when cooked" ("cooked" here referring to preparing food by denaturing proteins with acid rather than heat, similar to the preparation of ceviche). This food is believed to be similar to narezushi, i.e. that the fish was fermented for long times in conjunction with rice and was then eaten after removing the rice.

A century later, the meaning of the two characters had become confused and by the time these two characters arrived in Japan, the Chinese themselves did not distinguish between them. The Chinese had stopped using rice as a part of the fermentation process, and then stopped eating pickled fish altogether. By the Ming dynasty, "鮨" and "鮓" had disappeared from Chinese cuisine. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_sushi http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

For the final chapter of our 4 part history of sushi as it changed, grew and spread around the globe, we will be discussing the health benefits it offers and the different “spins” that have been put on it in recent times, primarily in the U.S. Stay tuned!

History Author: Kinja