Ingredients: Seaweed, rice, barbecued eel, avocado

Preparation: Inside-out

Popularity: Growing

Eel lovers totally dig this dish, but there’s not nearly as many eel lovers as there should be out there – especially in North America. 

The Unagi Roll is barbecued eel with a little avocado thrown in to cut the taste and texture with something smooth and sweet, and it’s a heck of a good combo.

Some sushi houses in your local area may vary a touch from this basic core of the dish (like adding cucumber or roe, or even other seafoods), but that tangy eel flavor and the sweet buttery goodness of the avocado are a potent combo.

Ingredients: Seaweed, rice, barbecued eel, cucumber

Preparation: Inside-out 

Popularity: Growing

Like the Anago Roll, the Anakyu Roll has many variations, and is growing in popularity as more and more people grow the cajones needed to stray from the usual US California Roll/Dynamite Roll diet.

Anakyu Roll is basically a Usagi Roll with cucumber added, though from sushi restaurant to sushi restaurant that’s likely to vary a touch.

Basically, for an Anakyu Roll to be good, the barbecued eel has to be primo. An Anakyu Roll with sub-standard eel is like steak tartare with a nasty piece of steak.

Ingredients: Seaweed, rice, barbecued eel (Anago), Japanese parsley (Mitsuba), cucumber

Preparation: Inside-out

Popularity: Growing

Though a lot of people still won’t try eel, just because it’s not as common to westerners as chicken, there are a growing number of sushi fiends who, while looking to try something different, stumble upon the flavor and texture of one of Japan’s most popular seafoods.

The Anago Roll is basically an eel roll, and as such it can be made many different ways. Some have mayonnaise, some use egg as the outer skin of the roll (as seen in the photo above), which gives it an interesting yellow appearance (especially when topped with gold fish eggs), but really the only thing that you need to make an Anago Roll and Anago Roll is, well, Anago.

Seriously, give it a try. Eel won’t bite… well, as long as it’s barbecued first, anyway.