What is Gunkan maki, a type of sushi?
This time I will introduce Gunkan maki, which you can eat at sushi restaurants.
Gunkan maki is sushi made of vinegared rice wrapped in seaweed
Gunkan maki is a type of sushi that is made by wrapping vinegared rice with seaweed and placing ingredients on the top such as salmon roe or sea urchin. It is said that Gunkan maki’s name comes from Gunkan, which means warship, because its appearance when viewed from the side resembles a warship.
There seem to be various theories, but the most popular one is that the owner of the high-class sushi restaurant “Kyubei” in Ginza, Tokyo, came up with the idea of making salmon roe into sushi after a customer ordered “I wanted to try some unusual sushi.” It is said that things are first. Nowadays, in addition to salmon roe and sea urchin, various types of gunkanmaki are made using soft and easily crumbly toppings, such as crab miso and green onion.
How do you eat Gunkan maki?
In the past, many people thought it was good manners to eat sushi with your hands, but it is not bad manners to use chopsticks. We also recommend that you try eating frigate maki with your hands instead of using chopsticks because it tends to fall apart easily.
Next is the etiquette for adding soy sauce. For regular nigiri, instead of adding soy sauce to the vinegared rice, you can turn the sushi on its side and apply soy sauce to the sushi toppings, allowing you to eat smartly without the rice falling apart. However, in the case of Gunkan Maki, if you turn the sushi on its side, the sushi toppings will fall out, so it is generally better to hold both sides of the gunkanmaki with your thumb and forefinger and put a little soy sauce on the edge of the vinegared rice. You can eat it. Another method is to dip the gari that comes with sushi in soy sauce and apply it like a brush to the sushi toppings.
