【Reading】ぶえんずし

【English Name】Buen sushi

Buen-zushi is a type of regional sushi handed down in Matsushima Town, Kamiamakusa City, Kumamoto Prefecture. "Buen" is a word derived from "muen" (unsalted), meaning fresh fish that has not been salt-cured. The word "muen" appears as far back as "The Tale of the Heike" (Heike Monogatari), used as an expression for raw ingredients that have not undergone preservation treatment.

The preparation involves marinating white-fleshed fish such as sea bream (tai), dotted gizzard shad (konoshiro), and Japanese sea bass (suzuki), landed that day, in vinegar, then mixing them into vinegared rice together with vegetables such as carrot, burdock (gobo), shiitake mushroom, and dried strips of daikon radish (kiriboshi daikon). It is characterized by the sweetish seasoning distinctive of the Amakusa region. As a finishing touch it is shaped by pressing and firming, devised to preserve the fish's freshness by minimizing exposure to air.

In the Matsushima district it has been cherished as an indispensable dish for weddings and celebratory occasions. On the other hand, curiously, it is said to be hardly seen in areas other than Matsushima Town, making it a regional cuisine that has been passed down within an extremely limited area. In recent years, younger generations have come to lack the skill of filleting fish, and a crisis of transmission due to a shortage of successors has been pointed out.