Preface photo/Bridget Johnson
By BRIDGET JOHNSON
Staff Writer
On Wednesday, Oct, 23, Yoshiko Green, Japanese language professor, gave students a lesson in rolling sushi. The sushi demonstration happens once a year with the help of Japanese Club students and friends of Green.
This year, students were also taught to make mochi, sticky rice that is smashed with wooden mallets into a pliable outer layer and filled with sweet red bean paste. The demonstration offers students a chance to try traditional Japanese sushi and make sushi rolls of their own.
Keri Oursler, freshman, and Christian Holdeman, sophomore, attended the demonstration for the first time.
“I made my own sushi. It was fun,” said Holdeman.
Students circled Green as she explained the process and reminisced about her childhood.
“My mom always gave me eight pieces of sushi for lunch because eight is a lucky number in Japan,” Green said.
Green also explained to the crowd why ginger is included with orders of sushi:
“You take the ginger and dip it in soy sauce then rub the sushi with the ginger. That way, you don’t have rice falling apart in the soy sauce.”
Not many people were interested in eating the ginger alone, but Green ate a piece in front of a student who said she hated ginger. Green’s sense of humor kept the crown enthralled.
Green has been hosting sushi demonstrations at IUSB for over ten years and labors over premade rolls. Fresh tuna, salmon, crab meat and shrimp were available to students as well as sweet egg. Green said her husband asks why she does this every year when it is so much work.
In reply to her husband, Green says, “I love my students. They study hard. They should have sushi.”
Attendance this year was robust. The Grill was filled with onlookers and participants.
“I do it every year so hopefully students learn something of Japanese culture,” Green said.
