Summary: sushi
Comment: It's a great book, very good picture and easy instruction
It's a great buy.
Customer Rating:
Summary: The best-looking and most complete beginner book on sushi.
Comment: This is a great book for a sushi beginner, such as myself. It simply provides you with all of the essential information to begin making sushi at home. The book doesn't go into a lot of depth on each subject, rather providing the reader with a solid foundation to begin exploring the world of sushi. The book covers: Sushi ingredients, history, etiquette, terminology, decoration, some basic fish filleting, a little sashimi, some soups and most importantly the sushi! It guides you though the basic types of sushi with large, step-by-step photographic instructions on how to form it. And each type of sushi has many variations to try out. You'll be pulling off inside-out California rolls in no time! Another plus is the design. This is one good looking book. Nice, full-page photographs help to reinforce the importance of aesthetics in sushi preparation and the cover is suitable for any coffee table. Pair it up with a sister book such as 'Sashimi' - by Hideo Dekura, or any of the other 'Essential Kitchen Series' books (same beautiful design) and you'll have a very attractive cookbook selection. Search for 'Essential Kitchen Series' to see what I mean. I was impressed, anyway. Great book, get it now!
Customer Rating:
Summary: Good Book for Good Food
Comment: This is a beautifully illustrated book. It provides step by step visual instructions. Very good for the begginer. Have fun!
Customer Rating:
Summary: When I saw this book in the sushi section of our supermarket
Comment: I knew that good ole Amazon will come to my rescue with reasonable prices for a fabulous book. The hardcover book of 111 pages is chock a block full of colour illustrations (something that I am happy to see extending into many of today's newly published cookbooks) that allow the reader not only to learn how to make sushi but also see the presentation UP CLOSE AND PERSONAL. Although this book is not an encyclopedia of the sushi fare it is what the title suggests the essential sushi. It was really great to see that chef Yoshii describes making the classic Tuna rolls using Japanses techique of putting a pich of wasabi in the roll rather than an Americanized version that contains no wasabi. I mean I can't believe some of the new yuppie sushi restaurants cropping up and dumbing down a fabulous Japanese dish! This is a must have book for your kitchen and willsave you a tuna roll of money if you have a sushi dinner party at homein the classic Japanese style ....
Customer Rating:
Summary: Excellent introduction book
Comment: This is an excellent beginner book on sushi. And if you are a visual person, the photography and design of the book are first rate. I would recommend it highly as a "coffee table" book and as a place to start learning to make sushi.
It starts with a useful dictionary like selection with photos that identifies many basic tools and ingredients. Then gives tips on selecting fish. Something I really appreciated was just one standard way of preparing a whole fish. Most other books duplicate fish preparation for the endless nigiri types, but are grossly incomplete for beginner. Besides, I'll suggest that the average person isn't even going to find these "exotic" fish at a local market. Many types of fish have extremely limited availability and can be expensive. Most will likely buy portions of raw fish that is (probably frozen and) preprepared from an Asian market. Fortunately though, once you get the basic tools and ingredients from an Asian market, many basic types of sushi in this book can be made from seafood or vegetables that can be found at any Grocery Store.
This book has ample photographs for each step in preparation of various "rolled" (maki) sushi including reverse rolls, and also for nigiri preparation. Another noted standout in this book are the exposure to ideas for making sushi out of vegetables, a special plus for those with limited taste for raw fish. This book describes tamago, inari, chirashi, gunkan sushi as well as ideas for garnishes and also has a few basic soup recipes.
Sushi is not difficult to make, but it does take practice to get the hang of it. If you really are into it, no book of this type is going to tell you everything. However, each will give new ideas if the "art" of sushi preparation interests you. To really learn to make a full meal that looks attractive and tasty, you will eventually want some 3" thick book on Japanese Cooking, though after you are comfortable with the basics. I can't recommend a better place to start than here.