For other uses, see California Roll. As one of the most popular styles of sushi in Canada and the United States, the California roll has been influential in sushi’s boston roll sushi ingredients popularity, and in inspiring sushi chefs around the world to create non-traditional fusion cuisine.

The identity of the creator of the California roll is disputed. Several chefs from Los Angeles have been cited as the dish’s originator, as well as one chef from Vancouver. The earliest mention in print of a ‘California roll’ was in the Los Angeles Times and an Ocala, Florida newspaper on November 25, 1979. Others attribute the dish to Ichiro Mashita, another Los Angeles sushi chef from the former Little Tokyo restaurant “Tokyo Kaikan”. Accounts of these first ‘California Rolls’ describe a dish very different from the one today. Early California roll recipes used frozen king crab legs, since surimi imitation crab was not yet available locally and importing it was not convenient.

Japanese-born chef Hidekazu Tojo, a resident of Vancouver since 1971, claimed he created the California roll at his restaurant in the late 1970s. Tojo insists he is the innovator of the “inside-out” sushi, and it got the name “California roll” because its contents of crab and avocado were abbreviated to C. Regardless of who invented it, after becoming a favorite in southern California the dish became popular all across the United States by the 1980s. In Imaizumi’s account, as reported by Kamp, the roll was developed with the intent to placate the immigrant Japanese clientele during tuna’s off-season and only later caught on with Caucasian clients too squeamish to eat raw fish on the first try. That native Japanese were the initial target is also reinforced by Corson’s writings. In Issenberg 2007 and other references, the chief eyewitness source for the California roll story is Noritoshi Kanai of Mutual Trading, an importer that was the supplier to the restaurant. In the San Diego Union piece, it is his daughter Atsuko Kanai, vice president of Mutual Trading, who credits Mashita with making the roll “inside-out”.

Specialités de la Maison—California”, Gourmet, vol. Margo Feiden’s The calorie factor: the dieter’s companion. The United States of Arugula: The Sun Dried, Cold Pressed, Dark Roasted, Extra Virgin Story of the American Food Revolution. Trevor Corson himself, rather than his book, Corson 2008. Anthony Valainis, “Roll Call: a Roster of the City’s Best Sushi Spots”, Indianapolis, p.

American Tuna: The Rise and Fall of an Improbable Food. Raw Fish is the Rage around Los Angeles”. Sushi: The Story of the California Roll”. The most widely spread story is that Ichiro Mashita invented the roll when he realized that the oily texture of avocado is a perfect substitute for toro, a fatty tuna. Will The Real Inventor of The California Roll Please Stand Up? The History of the California Roll”. You can’t walk into a sushi restaurant without finding the California roll on the menu.