We did it!! and it was so much easier than we thought it would be. I’m talking about making our own sushi rolls at home for dinner. Last week, for Valentines day, my husband and I got out all of the tools and ingredients that we needed and looked at each other and though, okay, where do we start?
It really wasn’t as hard as we thought it would be…it does make quite a mess though in your kitchen!
I went to an asian market and got everything I needed to make it as authentic as possible. Short grain sushi rice, crab meat, tuna, salmon, shrimp and shrimp tempura that was ready to bake in the oven. I got too much 😉 but it was a lot of fun to try a little of each.
I bought $40 worth of items to make sushi and no lie, we could have made about 25 rolls with all of it. We only made 6.
Prepping the veggies and making the rice is where you want to begin. Below you will see the ingredients for sushi rice. Yes, it’s not just cooked rice, like I thought! I used my rice cooker, made about 2 cups of rice with 3 cups of water. While that was cooking on the stove in a pot, add rice vinegar, sugar, salt and a little vegetable oil and heat until the sugar disappears.
Once, the rice is finished, move it into a bowl and then pour the rice vinegar, sugar, salt and vegetable oil into the bowl. Mix it all up and then let that sit for 10-15 mins. to cool.
Next, comes the fun part! Decide what kind of sushi you want to make. I searched online for different types that were easy for beginners. We used cucumber, carrots, and avocado; chopped them up like matchsticks, and sliced the avocado thin. Then, laid out the fish and shrimp in little bowls to easily pick from.
What made our sushi making experience so easy was a sushi kit that I ordered from amazon. You can see it in the pictures. It explained how to make and roll the sushi using their tools and it worked perfectly!! You can also use a bamboo rolling mat with plastic wrap.
I also picked up sheets of nori dried seaweed at the store (you can order this online, too)…when you lay this down on the rice (or under the rice), make sure to put the rough side up.
Once the rice cools, you will lay a thin layer down on top of the nori, start placing a thin line of each fish or shrimp in a pile horizontally along the lower third of the wrap with vegetables or avocado in a pile on top of that. I also got spicy sriracha mayo and wasabi to add in a few.
To roll- Start to roll the sushi away from you. The first roll will cover the sushi, then roll it sushi over again into a tight log. Again, the kit that I bought made it super easy for us. It also gave me a cutting tool that had slits for where to place the knife and made perfect pieces. You do need to use a wet knife, or it will get too sticky when trying to slice. So run it under water every few times you slice.
Then you’re done!! It will take a few times to get the roll down and to figure out the magic amount of ingredients to put inside without it being too much or not enough. Check out my pictures below to see what we made 🙂
Ingredients: This website was a huge help!
- ¼ cup plain Rice Vinegar
- 2 tablespoons sugar
- 1 teaspoon salt
(Mix all three of the ingredients in a pot on the stove until the sugar disappears)
- 2 cups Sushi Rice
- 2 cups water
- 6-8 sheets of nori
(dried seaweed)
- cooked and seasoned sushi rice
- 2-3 tablespoons Sesame Seeds
( I forgot these, but they would be good!)
- Vegetables of choice, here’s what I used:
- 2 small carrots, peeled and cut into matchsticks
- 5-inch piece of English cucumber, seeded and cut into matchsticks
- ripe avocados cut into thin pieces
- You can also use sliced bell pepper, sprouts, green onion, radish, mushrooms, etc.
- Pickled Sushi Ginger
, for serving
- Wasabi
, optional
- Reduced Sodium Tamari
or soy sauce, for dipping
