How to make sushi

Japan is a home for many kinds of sushi, but in foreign countries, Sushi no longer exist, and even if it does, not at its original form. It is important to say that the origin of sushi is not Japan. Original "sushi" comes from 7 th century China. People began making sushi to preserve fish by fermentation since there where no refrigerators. Since rice and salt where one of the key ingredients in fish fermentation, sushi became closely related to Japan. And there, it evolved into the current sushi, which combine fish and rice.

Since Japan is surrounded with water, a wide variety of fish could be potentially found. And the topography of Japan is mountainous, so it also makes a great environment for rice cultivation. Japanese people have always fed themselves from sea and rice fields.

Original method of sushi preparation included the following steps:
 * The cleaned raw fish was pressed between layers of salt, and stone was placed to weight it.
 * After few weeks (usually three), stone would be removed and placed with a light cover.
 * Few months later, fermented fish and rice where ready to be consumed.

There are few restaurants in Japan that are still serving originally-style sushi. That kind of sushi is called "nare" – sushi made with freshwater carp.

During the eighteenth century, a chef named Yohei decided to serve sushi in its present form. It became very popular in a short period of time and it evolved in two styles: First one was "Kanasai" style, named by Kansai - region in Japan. And the second one was named "Edo" style, from Tokyo, which was called Edo in that time.

Kansai style sushi consisted seasoned rice mixed with other ingredients, including very decorative packages, and it has more history and techniques to it comparing to the Edo style sushi. Edo style sushi is nigiri sushi (it is also known as Edomae-sushi); this kind of sushi had small amounts of seafood on seasoned rice.

Kansai region's ornamental sushi is very popular, but foreigners are more interested in nigiri sushi.

Nare-sushi is a sushi made with carp in the vicinity of Lake Biwa in Shiga Prefecture, and believe it or not preparing this sushi takes from 2 months to more than one year. When it was eaten, they only ate the fish, and discarded the rice. People eventually understood that this was a process that consumed too much time and wasted a lot of rice. These thoughts led to the development of nama-nare or han-nare sushi, which can be made in a few days, and it consisted of eating both fish and the rice.