Rice dishes ── Sushi
Bo-zushi
fish and rice rolled bar-shaped with a bamboo mat
Vinegar-cured fish laid over rice and rolled bar-shaped with a bamboo mat before slicing — a form of pressed sushi seen in Kyoto's saba-zushi and regional saury and mackerel versions elsewhere.
Lineage
What it's made of
Fish cured in salt and vinegar, kept in a single fillet, is laid over rice and rolled bar-shaped with firm pressure from a bamboo mat. Unlike box-pressed hako-zushi's square edges, this comes out rounded and log-shaped, and each slice shows an oval cross-section capped by the fish's skin. Oily-skinned fish like mackerel and saury are the usual choice.
How it's made
Fish is boned, salted, then cured further in vinegar. Laid skin-side up over rice, it's rolled tight with a bamboo mat, pulled firm from the near edge, and shaped into a log. Left briefly to let the flavors settle, it's then sliced into rounds about two centimeters wide.
Why it took this shape
It's thought to have developed in places far from the sea, as a way of carrying fish cured with salt and vinegar to keep it, then pairing it with rice once it arrived. Rolling it bar-shaped kept the fish from falling apart while allowing even, uniform slices — a way to serve a hard-won fish without waste, said to survive today in Kyoto's saba-zushi and regional celebration sushi elsewhere.
Before you go
- How to read a vertical menuIn shops with strips of handwritten menu items on the wall, the top-right spot is often used for recommendations.
- How to use a convenience storeA quick guide to choosing rice balls and hot snacks, buying coffee, paying by cash, IC card, or tap payment, using the eat-in corner, and sorting your trash — the basics for a first visit.
- How to shop at a supermarketHow to choose prepared foods, sashimi, and packaged sushi, when discount stickers tend to appear, region-only specialties, buying by weight, the checkout and bagging flow, and sampling etiquette at a local supermarket.
Dishes in the same style
- Aburi-zushiNigiri with just its surface flash-seared by torch or hot iron. Unlike Edomae's shigoto curing for keeping, the searing here is done purely for the change in aroma and fat it brings — a relatively recent way of eating sushi.
- Aichi HakozushiVinegared rice is packed into a wooden frame, topped with shrimp, eel, shiitake, and egg arranged diagonally, and pressed. Placing toppings on the diagonal so everyone gets a fair share of each is said to be a feature of the Owari and western Mikawa style, made for celebrations.
Ingredients and dishes from this land
Derived style
- Saba-zushiBar-pressed mackerel sushi raised where the 'mackerel highway' from Wakasa ended — a landlocked capital's answer to its hunger for fish.
- Sanma-zushiA rod-pressed sushi from Kumano, Mie, made by butterflying saury along the back and curing it in citrus vinegar. Said to trace to a shrine ritual for children's growth, and made widely along the Kii Peninsula coast.