There is a lot of fish

[keannu]

Is this "there is" for a singular fish or plural fish? If for plural fish, I've seen some out-of-grammar expressions such as "There's a lot of reasons for that" or "There's many houses on the hill" and these are quite normal among native speakers.

ex)..Japanese chopsticks are a bit shorter than Chinese chopsticks because Japanese people raise their bowls up to their mouths while eating....There is a lot of fish in Japanese food and the pointed ends help to separate the fish bones...

[emsr2d2]

Is this "there is" for a singular fish or plural fish? If for plural fish, I've seen some out-of-grammar expressions such as "There's a lot of reasons for that" or "There's many houses on the hill" and these are quite normal among native speakers.

ex)..Japanese chopsticks are a bit shorter than Chinese chopsticks because Japanese people raise their bowls up to their mouths while eating....There is a lot of fish in Japanese food and the pointed ends help to separate the fish bones...

In this context, "fish" is the name of a single food group so "There is" is appropriate.