Fusion cuisine combines elements of various culinary traditions while not fitting specifically into any. The term generally refers to the innovations in many contemporary restaurant cuisines since the 1970s.

This type of restaurant's success depends on a number of factors. Among these are:

• Clientele's (or prospective clientele's) cultural diversity
• Clientele's travel patterns and experiences.
• Clientele's culinary sophistication and openness to new eating experiences.

These factors have made this type of cuisine accepted and popular in places like California and in large metropolitan areas. California Chef Wolfgang Puck is known as one of the pioneers of fusion cuisine. However, his restaurant "Chinois" was named after the term attributed to Richard Wing, who in the 1960s combined French and Chinese cooking at the former Imperial Dynasty restaurant in Hanford, California.

A menu sampling from menu of an American-European-Japanese restaurant in California might include the following items:

• Sake cocktails
• Salad with crisp nori topping, and a miso-cilantro vinaigrette dressing
• Rock shrimp dumplings
• Eel, lettuce and tomato sushi handroll
• Poached tofu

Categories and types

While fusion cuisine is a general term for the combination of various forms of cookery, the concept can take several forms. One approach is regional fusion that combines the cuisine of a region or sub-region into a single eating experience. Of these sort, Asian fusion restaurants have become popular in many parts of the United States, often featuring Indian, East Asian, and South-East Asian dishes along side one another and offering dishes that are inspired combinations of such cuisines.

Another incarnation of fusion cuisine the more eclectic approach, featuring original dishes using varieties of ingredients from various cuisines and regions and combining them. Such restaurants are often trendy and have no singular thematic cohesion other than innovative eclecticism in their menus. Such a restaurant might feature a wide variety of dishes inspired by combinations of various regional cuisines with new ideas.

Since fusion cuisine is a general term, it is legitimately applied to either sort of restaurant. While many diners feature dishes from Greek, Italian, and sometimes Asian cuisines side-by-side, these restaurants are generally not considered fusion as they fail to combine any elements of the cooking styles and also have no over-arching fusion or eclectic theme.