The Story of Sushi by Trevor Corson Read Free Book Online

was to add water for cooking. But before adding the water, Takumi did something that might be considered cheating.
    Traditionally, sushi chefs cook their sushi rice with a splash of sake and a strip of kelp to add flavor. Instead, Takumi reachedfor a maroon can of white powder manufactured by the Otsuka Chemical Industry Corporation. This substance, known by its trade name Miora, came into commercial use as a rice additive in Japan after World War II. When labeled for sale in the United States, a sticker on the can declares in English that the ingredients are simply “potato starch and glucose.” But the Japanese ingredients list includes other items—enzymes called amylase and protease, plus “kelp flavor.”
    Amylase breaks starch down into glucose. Protease breaks protein down into amino acids. Cooking with Miora creates rice with unnaturally high levels of glucose and amino acids, which makes the rice sweeter and gives it more of the tasty flavor of umami. As for “kelp flavor,” that’s usually just code for MSG.
    Rice cooked with Miora makes people want to return to their favorite sushi restaurants again and again. Because of all the glucose, some doctors worry that the body will convert more of this rice to fat. In using the Miora, Takumi was simply following standard practice at Hama Hermosa. It’s likely that more sushi restaurants use Miora than anyone would like to admit.
    Takumi measured the proper amount of water and poured it into the cooker bowl. Sushi chefs cook their rice with less water than if they were cooking rice for regular use. Too much moisture softens the grains, makes them too sticky, and prevents them from absorbing the vinegar mixture the chef adds after cooking. But too little water also prevents the rice from absorbing the vinegar because the starches in the core of the grain will reharden before the vinegar gets a chance to penetrate.
    Takumi switched on the rice cooker. While the first batch of rice began to boil, he set out a low-sided cypress tub. He poured in enough water to cover the bottom and left it to soak. The cypress had to be wet before he dumped in the cooked rice. Otherwise, the absorbent wood would suck the moisture from the rice. He checked the clock again. Time was running out.
    When the rice had finished cooking Takumi emptied the water from the cypress tub. Then he yanked the rice out of the cooker by the edges of the Teflon net and lugged it toward the tub. Steam billowed around his forearms. He flipped the mesh bag upside down into the tub in a huge cloud of steam.
    Small clumps of rice still stuck to the Teflon net. Tens of thousands of tiny rice gods were in peril of not making it into the tub. Takumi started to pick the grains of rice off one by one.
    Zoran dove in and snatched the net from Takumi’s hands.
    “Come on, don’t worry about it!” Zoran barked. Zoran tossed the net in the sink. Takumi glanced at the clock. There was other work to be done.
    He washed the second batch of rice while the first batch cooled. If he added the vinegar too soon after cooking, the rice wouldn’t soak it up. But if he let the rice sit too long, it would start to harden and wouldn’t absorb the vinegar, either. At the right moment, he returned and poured Hama Hermosa’s recipe of sushi vinegar over the cooling rice. In a tiny office off the kitchen, the recipe was taped to the wall: seven parts rice vinegar, five parts sugar, one part salt.
     
    In the 1600s, in the area around Kyoto, the recipe for “quick sushi” came to include not just vinegar in the rice but sugar as well. It tasted good, and along with the vinegar, the sugar helped prevent the rice from spoiling for a few days. Sugar molecules love water. When water is in short supply, they suck it right out of the bodies of bacteria and the bacteria die. That’s why fruit jellied with lots of sugar is called “preserves.”
    In Japan, the sweetness of sushi rice has varied by region and era. When sushi spread to