Sushi Etiquette: How to Eat Sushi, Use Soy Sauce, Wasabi and Ginger

Sushi bars are relaxed about most things, but a few habits make the food taste better and keep the chef happy.

Eating nigiri

One bite. Nigiri is shaped to be eaten whole. Biting it in half breaks the rice apart.
Hands are fine. Fingers are traditional for nigiri; chopsticks are fine too. Sashimi is eaten with chopsticks.
Fish side down into soy sauce, and only lightly. Rice soaks up soy and falls apart.
No soy when it is brushed. If the chef has already glazed the piece with nikiri or tsume, eat it as served.
Go easy on wasabi. Good chefs put wasabi between fish and rice already. Mixing a paste of wasabi into the soy dish is common at casual places but not at a counter.
Ginger between pieces. Gari resets your palate; it is not a topping.

Do not rub disposable chopsticks together; it suggests they are cheap.
Never stand chopsticks upright in rice or pass food chopstick to chopstick. Both recall funeral rites.
Use the chopstick rest, or lay them across your soy dish, between bites.

Order or ask questions in a normal voice, and avoid strong perfume: it competes with the fish.
Eat each piece as soon as it is served, and ask before taking photos.

Take plates from the belt and do not put them back. Plate colours show the price; staff count them at the end, or you order fresh pieces on a tablet. Find kaiten shops by filtering "Kaiten" in the directory.

New to the menu? Look up any piece in the sushi guide, or read your first omakase.