Sushi is an integral part of Japanese cuisine. A lot goes into the creation of these elegant dishes, and their small portions allow you to try a variety of different types without getting too full. When visiting a sushi restaurant, you may be wondering if you’ve found a good one. Here are 5 signs a sushi restaurant has high quality sushi.
Looks as Good as It Tastes
Sushi masters take pride in their work. It’s not just a meal to fill you up, it should be a feast for the senses. This includes how it looks as well as how it tastes. One of the hallmarks of a high-quality sushi restaurant is that the sushi is visually appealing.
This comes down in part to the ingredients, but also the sushi chef preparing the sushi. How the fish and nori are cut and placed all have a factor in the mouth feel of the sushi.
Besides being presented well, the fish should look fresh and colorful—never dull or discolored.
Fresh Ingredients
Sushi is made with a variety of vegetables as well as the fish itself. All of these ingredients should be fresh. Fresh vegetables provide crunch to the texture, and fresh fish is needed to balance the flavor. Some fish do need to be marinated, salted or dry-aged to bring out their flavor, but a good sushi chef will know what is needed to bring out the best of that particular fish.
Smells Fresh and Clean
Although many of us think of a ‘fishy’ smell when we think of seafood, the restaurant shouldn’t smell fishy. It should actually have a fresh, clean scent—a bit like the smell of cucumber or freshly cut watermelon.
That fresh, crisp scent is a sign of fresh fish and general cleanliness.
Perfect Rice
Sushi uses sticky rice to help give sushi its texture. It needs to be both sticky enough to hold the sushi together, but not so sticky it’s turned into mush or has a clumpy texture. The ideally prepared rice should hold its form as it’s coming to your mouth, but break apart into individual grains once you start chewing it.
Good rice is tricky to perfect, which is why it is a clear sign of a sushi chef’s talents.
Mouthfeel
What happens when you combine perfect rice, crisp vegetables, high quality fish and a skilled chef? Truly good sushi prepared by a competent person will melt in your mouth. It does not need soy sauce or wasabi to add flavor. Each piece has its own unique flavors and can be appreciated without any additional sauces. This can take quite a bit of skill by the chef to balance, and takes into part many of our other signs of a quality
At first, it may seem like all sushi restaurants are the same. This is not the case. Once you have experienced truly high-quality sushi, you’ll notice the difference. High-quality sushi is truly worth seeking it out.
