When can he eat sushi?

The cooked stuff you can definitely share with him. The kids I nanny for (we actually had sushi for lunch today!), really like unagi (sweet freshwater eel), and tamago (egg omelet), and they will occasionally eat a cali roll as well.

I'm probably on the extreme end of things, but my DD has been eating sushi happily since she was about a year. She LOVES going out for sushi but the last couple of times the only thing she'd eat was salmon eggs. Yes, raw. They are fun to pick up and they taste just like cod liver oil, which she adores. She also likes the tobiko (flying fish roe). And she also eats salmon sashimi, octopus, seaweed (she actually loves kelp flakes as a snack generally) and the vermicelli noodles that come in sunomono salad, etc.

The only thing I don't let her have, beyond little tastes, is tuna, because of the mercury issue. And she's not fond of unagi (bbq eel).

Please be VERY cautious about feeding a child younger than three any shellfish whatsoever - It is one of the allergens that needs to be held off the longest, even longer than peanuts. This is especially important if you have allergies in the family or of your child has shown food senstivity to other foods. I got this advice from my dad, an old school medical doctor with classical training who raised his children to be as omnivorous and eclectic in their food tastes as possible (I mean, he took us to Sushi as kids in the early 80s... before it b/c common here in the states at all...) What this means for us as a family is that we avoid eating out at Thai and Vietnamese resturants b/c of "Fish sauce" (shrimp based) and shrimp paste. Sad very sad, but till she's three, a truth. I think that sushi grade fin fish would be OK for a young toddler (over 1 year).

I fed my kids cooked sushi since they were old enough to eat.
I don't normally eat the raw myself, so that hasn't been an issue with us.

My super picky older dd started at around 2. I was given a special "just for me" handroll to try and they were shocked as she wrestled it out of my hands. It had spicy mayo on it and they were telling me to get it out of her hands. She ate it all. I didn't get any. We got hooked on the spicy mayo and went back there on a regular basis and she always had it. She stopped liking sushi about a year ago (at 6). Silly girl!

DD's father has an anaphylactic allergy to fish/shellfish so I don't know that I will ever give her fish. My other kids ate sushi around 1 1/2 -2. One of them does have food allergies, but not to fish.

My main concern would be with the contaminants in the fish. There is lots of into out there about which types of fish have the least contaminants, and whether you should get farmed or wild, etc. There is also info on location -- e.g., salmon caught in one part of the world are more contaminated than those caught in another part. If the sushi place can tell you where they got their fish, and if it is farmed or wild, you can make a good decision about probable level of contamination. I'm fairly certain that things like mercury, heavy metals, etc., affect children at much smaller levels than adults. I mean, obviously we don't want it at all, but I am more concerned about exposing young children to it than I am about exposing myself to it.

That said, we eat sushi occasionally, but I haven't given any to dd yet. Again, due to the contaminant concern (I have not bothered to ask where they get their fish because we eat it so rarely).

My dd LOVES sushi and has been eating the non-raw fish stuff for a long time and just recently started trying sashimi and likes it - she is 21 months.

I was surprised how heatedly people discussed this same topic a few months ago.

I haven't given any to my DS yet but i would around 2 y/o i guess.. (he is almost 14 months)

also i prefer homemade sushi

and yes there is "cooked sushi" I *Think* sushi refers to the *rice*

i've had cooked sushi (as in shrimp, crab)

We make our own sushi stuff, and maki are great fun to make with the kids, we buy the fish from a really good fish shop and when we tell them its to eat raw they give us the freshest - in fact now that they know us fairly well they give us some lovely fish, ds LOVES raw tuna sashimi style and avocado rolls, dd LOVES avocado and prawn rolls Cali style - the prawns are cooked. We're going to have some on Saturday night - can't wait - it's almost addictive!!

My approach is that, leaving aside choking hazards, my toddler can eat whatever I can eat. Basta.