Are you wary of trying out sushi? Do you avoid sushi because you are not very fond of fish? The Sushi Unrolled food promotion, currently on at The Fatty Bao in Bengaluru, Mumbai and Kolkata till April 8, offers a range of 14 sushi preparations, and aims to make the Japanese delicacy more popular in India and break popular misconceptions about it.
Prashanth Puttaswamy, the executive chef, says, “Sushi is essentially cold, cooked rice dressed with vinegar, shaped and topped with raw or cooked fish, or rolled with fish, egg, or vegetables and often wrapped in seaweed. It is not always raw. Over the past couple of decades, sushi has become very popular across the world. It is a huge hit in the United States and is available across South East Asia. Many Indians travelling outside the country are comfortable with it. However, due to notions of sushi being raw fish and apprehension about the freshness of the seafood, it is not as popular as dimsums or tacos in India. Through this promotion, we have tried to make it fun and have experimented with different forms. While sushi has morphed around the world, it remains the most popular Japanese food and there’s so much to explore in this delicacy.”
He adds, “We have tried to make sushi more relatable to the Indian palate. For instance, we are offering a sushi pizza. It has a rice base and uses all the ingredients used in sushis, served with sauces and wasabi paste.”
We sampled some portions of the tuna sushi pizza with marinated thin slices of tuna, jalapeño, cream cheese mayo, tobiko , fried capers and mustard cress and were impressed with the taste and flavour. The base of the pizza offers an extra crunch and the tuna slices went well with the cream cheese mayo and jalapeño combination.
Another must-try item in the promotion is the crunchy sushi taco. You can choose from the fried eggplant taco sushi with chilli miso, cucumber, radish and fried garlic chips or the spicy salmon taco sushi with sriracha mayo. Prashanth adds, “Tacos are very popular. We used a nori sheet to perfect the shape.” With a slightly-sweet-and-sour flavour, the tacos also scored on the taste quotient.
The sandwich sushi was quite fascinating, with the traditional bamboo sushi mat replaced with a banana leaf. We loved the tomato-filled rainbow spin sandwich sushi with marinated slices of vegetables and sriracha sauce. The slightly-sour after-taste of the tomato balances the spicy flavour of the sriracha sauce quite well.
However, the star of the meal was, without doubt, the hosomaki sushi — rolled, fried, sliced and topped with cheese with a selection that included grilled soy braised wild mushrooms and cheese, and spicy tempura fried prawns. These versions are topped with cheddar cheese and make a filling meal by themselves. Prashanth concludes, “As more people become aware of the different versions of this dish, I’m sure it will find more takers in the country.”
Sushi Unrolled will be underway at The Fatty Bao outlets in Bengaluru, Kolkata and Mumbai (Powai, Andheri, Bandra and Kamala Mills) till April 8, 2018.
