History
In the 1960s, Los Angeles, California became the entry point for sushi chefs from Japan seeking to make their fortune in the United States. The Tokyo Kaikan restaurant then featured one of the first sushi bars in Los Angeles. Ichiro Mashita, a sushi chef at the Kaikan, began substituting avocado for toro (fatty tuna), and after further experimentation, the California roll was born. (The date is often given as the early 1970s in other sources.) Mashita realized the oily texture of avocado was a perfect substitute for toro. Traditionally sushi rolls are wrapped with nori on the outside. But Mashita also eventually made the roll "inside-out", i.e. uramaki, because Americans did not like seeing and chewing the nori on the outside of the roll.
After becoming a favorite in Southern California it eventually became popular all across the United States by the 1980s. The roll contributed to sushi's growing popularity in the United States by easing diners into more exotic sushi options. Sushi chefs have since devised many kinds of rolls, beyond simple variations of the California roll. Many sushi restaurants in North America now feature a menu of such rolls.
Read more about this topic: California Roll
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“Regarding History as the slaughter-bench at which the happiness of peoples, the wisdom of States, and the virtue of individuals have been victimized—the question involuntarily arises—to what principle, to what final aim these enormous sacrifices have been offered.”
—Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770–1831)
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—Aristotle (384–323 B.C.)
“Whenever we read the obscene stories, the voluptuous debaucheries, the cruel and torturous executions, the unrelenting vindictiveness, with which more than half the Bible is filled, it would be more consistent that we called it the word of a demon than the Word of God. It is a history of wickedness that has served to corrupt and brutalize mankind.”
—Thomas Paine (1737–1809)