Attending the Rose Cafe with a sushi making demo opened my eyes to the functionality underlying cooking. Sushi, as far as I was concerned, was good because it tasted good. I, perhaps, had a vague idea that Japan was an island and that fish was probably pretty common, so the dish emerged from fresh fish being available. This cafe demonstrated to me, however, that there was more to sushi than that.

Historically, fish was preserved for long periods of time using fermented rice as packaging. Eventually, technology changed and the fish was able to be preserved without the rice, but people had become used to eating the two together. The fact that this widely popular dish originated out of necessity and practicality boggles me. For all we know, some of the dishes that we make for practicality’s sake today could become widespread, cultural dishes tomorrow.