Sushi has its origins in a conservation method for fish from outside Japan. Originally, fish was fermented in rice and the rice was thrown away. At some point, Japanese people started shortening the fermentation period and ate the rice with the fish. And then in the Edo period they cut out the fermentation altogether and just added rice vinegar to the rice instead. But it’s still slightly sour so it still fits!
寿司 is just ateji anyway, the original spelling is 酸し
Interesting! In my dictionary I got
Where 酸い means acidic/sour! I wonder what that has to do with sushi as a type of food.
Sushi has its origins in a conservation method for fish from outside Japan. Originally, fish was fermented in rice and the rice was thrown away. At some point, Japanese people started shortening the fermentation period and ate the rice with the fish. And then in the Edo period they cut out the fermentation altogether and just added rice vinegar to the rice instead. But it’s still slightly sour so it still fits!
Oh that’s interesting. I didn’t know that, thanks!