Unagi, freshwater eel, is purchased pre-cooked, then grilled at the restaurant with “eel sauce.” Photo by SDS Studio | Fotolia.

Seafood

Category Main Page
Articles & Reviews

Fish-Seafood-Caviar

Category Main Page
Articles & Reviews

Main Nibbles

Main Page
Articles & Reviews Of Foods From A To Z

Product Reviews

Main Page
Food, Beverages, Books,
News & More

July 2007
Updated October 2009

Product Reviews / Main Nibbles / Fish, Seafood & Caviar

Types Of Sushi

And A Glossary Of Sushi & Sashimi Terms

Page 8: T to Z

Click on a letter to get to the appropriate page of the glossary.

a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z

This glossary is protected by copyright and cannot be reproduced in whole or part.

Tai: In Japan, this refers to the sea bream. It must be imported to the U.S., so often, according to an item in the Chicago Sun-Times (May 10, 2007), Japanese restaurants in the U.S. have begun referring to tilapia as tai—it is similar in flavor to tai (sea bream, related to porgy and daurade). Previously, U.S. sushi bars had been substituting red snapper for sea bream, but red snapper is not as easy to obtain as tilapia, and the newspaper quotes some sushi chefs as saying that red snapper isn’t well-suited for sushi or sashimi because its flesh is too soft. Real sea bream has a lovely white flesh with a pink hue, Octopus Sushi and red accents. Unless you know your fish, it is easy to confuse with sea bass, which has a similar coloring (but the red accents are more striped).

Tako: Octopus. Much octopus is frozen; it is also blanched because, like squid, it is too chewy to eat raw. Nama tako indicates fresh octopus.
Photo of tako by Radu Razvan | Fotolia.

Takuwan: Pickled daikon, generally deep yellow in color. Often part of an order of oshinko, and an excellent option for a vegetarian roll.

Tamago-yaki: Tamago is the Japanese word for egg. In sushi, it refers to a sweetened omelet made in a rectangular pan, cut into small rectangles for sushi or sashimi. When a slice of dried nori (seaweed) is wrapped around the slice of omelet, it is known as nori-tama. In Japan, tamago is the “signature dish” of each chef: Often potential customers will ask for a taste of it in order to judge the chef’s proficiency.
Photo of tamago by Yong Hian Lim | IST.

Tataki: Japanese for “finely chopped.” The equivalent of the French “tartare” (see photo at top of page).

Tarako: Alaska pollock roe.

Tazuna-sushi: A maki roll with diagonal strips of different-colored ingredients across the top—red maguro, orange salmon, green avocado, etc.—as colorful as a rainbow, and hence given the name “rainbow roll.” See rainbow roll.

Tekka-don: Slices of raw tuna over rice. This is tuna chirashi-style, except that chirashi implies an assortment of fish.

Tekka-maki: A tuna roll. The reason it is called tekka-maki and not maguro-maki has two derivations. “Tekka” means “iron on the fire” and in the old days, the red color of the fish looked like the color of a hot iron glowing in the fire. However, if you ordered a maguro maki, you would be understood; and maguro-temaki is the correct way to order a tuna hand roll. Tekka is also the word for Japanese gambling parlors in Japan, where the snack originated as a quick, hand-held food that could be eaten at the gaming table (as the sandwich was so the Earl of Sandwich could eat without interrupting his card game).

Tekka-maki: tuna roll.

Temaki-zushi: A temaki is a cone-shaped hand roll. Add the name of any fish or vegetable the word before temaki, and you will get that item wrapped with rice in a sheet of toasted seaweed. Maguro temaki is a tuna hand roll, hamachi temaki is a yellowtail hand roll, etc. For a photo, see Hand Roll.

Tobiko: Flying fish roe. Orange to red in color, these tiny, pinhead-size eggs are crunchy. They are served as in gunkan-maki (boat-style sushi rolls), and also used to coat the outsides of uramaki, “inside out” rolls or reverse rolls. One popular gunkan-maki is tobiko topped with an uncooked quail egg yolk (uzura no tamago). Photo at left of tobkio by Maria | IST.

Toro: The most tender part of the tuna, buttery, rich toro comes from the fatty belly portion. It is a smaller area, so a pricier part of the tuna, rosy in color rather than the bright red maguro that is more commonly served. It is often chopped with scallions for a negi-toro roll. At connoisseur sushi emporia, toro can be ordered as medium fat (chu-toro) and high fat (oo-toro)—similar to choosing the level of fat marbling you want on your steak. Interestingly, prior to the 1920s, when Japanese started adapting more Western dining habits, this fatty part of the fish was not considered prime and was used for cat food.

Tsukemono: Vinegared vegetables. This can include lightly marinated vegetables such as a salad of marinated bean sprouts, as well as pickles (oshinko), which can include Chinese cabbage, cucumber, daikon, ume and turnips. Gari is also a type of tsukemono. They are served with rice, and can be made into sushi.

Tuna: Several varieties of tuna are used for sushi and sashimi, including ahi (yellow fin) and maguro. Blue fin, big eye and albacore are different species of maguro. See also toro (above) and chu-toro.

Umeboshi: A small, bitter, pickled Japanese plum that is made into a paste (neri ume) used in a sushi roll.

Ume-shiso: A tart plum paste (neri ume) and shiso leaf mixture, a popular sushi roll (maki) combination in Japan. Japanese diners feel that ume clears the palate and leaves a pleasant aftertaste, and often order it to conclude a sushi dinner. Many American palates find the flavor too tart.

Unagi: Freshwater eel, which is richer than salt water or conger eel (anago). Eel is not served raw, but is pre-boiled, freshly grilled prior to serving and brushed with a rich sauce called kabayaki tare. Most of our unagi supply is imported pre-cooked from Taiwan and China, but is marinated and re-broiled by the restaurant.
Photo of unagi by Alexander Zhiltsov | IST.

Uni: The gonad of the sea urchin. Sea urchin is one of those foods that people Uni Sushi either love or hate. The taste can vary widely—people tend to think it is seasonality, but it is actually geographical. U.S. uni can come from California, the east coast of Canada, Maine and other regions, each with different nuances of flavor and appearance. The California uni tend to be sweeter and more creamy. Maine uni are reportedly less creamy, with a stronger taste. Even if one has a preference, each of these can be attractive as long as they are fresh. (Note: Lobsters love to eat uni!) Photo of uni by Radu Razvan | Fotolia.

Uramaki: Reverse roll or “inside out roll,” where the rice is on the outside of the sheet of nori instead of on the inside.

Uzura no tamago: Quail egg. A raw quail egg is often served on top of tobiko or uni in a gunkan-maki.

Wakame: A popular seaweed, long strands known as lobe-leaf seaweed, served as a vinegared salad (tsukemono) at sushi bars, as well as in miso soup.

Wasabi: In most restaurants, this is “faux wasabi,” a hot horseradish/mustard mixture that is served instead of real wasabi, to be mixed with soy sauce as a dip for sushi and sashimi. Read the difference between real wasabi and imitation wasabi.

Yakumi: Strongly-flavored seasonings such as grated daikon (daikon oroshi), finely- chopped scallions (negi) and a spice blend such as shichimi togarashi are used instead of wasabi on stronger-flavored nigiri such as aji, iwashi, katsuo and sanma. However, the technique has been expanded by some chefs, who use no wasabi or soy sauce on any of their sushi. In New York City, Sushi of Gari and Sushi Seki season each type of fish individually, ready to eat—white tuna with a concasse of tomato and onions, scallops with curried mayonnaise and salmon marinated in citrus vodka, for example. The results are spectacular.

Yellowtail: See hamachi. Yellowtail is a fish that is called different names depending on its age. Inada is a very young yellowtail, hamachi is medium age, buri an older yellowtail.

Zuke: Japanese for “marinated.” In the Edo Period, sushi was often served already marinated in soy sauce. Today, some creative sushi chefs serve pieces of sushi already marinated in citrus, saké or vodka, requiring no use of soy sauce.

Zushi: The more correct spelling for sushi; however, the “unvoiced” transliteration has caught on in the U.S., to the chagrin of Japanese-speaking people. A grammatical rule called rendaku governs the voicing of the initial consonant of the non-initial portion of a compound or prefixed word. Thus, the word “sushi” as a standalone noun would be pronounced with the unvoiced “s,” but when it becomes part of a compound noun, it becomes a voiced “z,” e.g., maki-zushi. There are also exceptions to the rule—all of which are too complex for Americans to follow. Thus, Japanese will continue to translate correctly, while Americans will continue to call everything “sushi” rather than attempt to figure out which is sushi and which is zushi.