Tuesday, May 25, 2010

White Girl Makes Sushi


The other night after school I was starving, as usual, and had little to no patience to make dinner. I know that you have all been there. I ran into Whole Foods Market with sushi on the brain. I grabbed a tuna roll and started to head for the check out when, out of habit, I annoyingly decided to read the ingredients and was SHOCKED to find a long list of them, and we are not talking tuna, nori, and rice. I moaned in frustration and put the sushi back, vowing that when I had more time, I would make my own.


So folks here we are. I went to the Asian market today and picked up a bamboo sushi mat, some nori, cucumber, carrots, and avocado. I figured I would try a veggie roll the first time just to keep it simple. I wanted to a roll with brown rice to keep with my whole “health food nut” thing. Brown rice is unmilled, meaning that it keeps its bran and germ layers, which contain the majority of the B vitamins and antioxidants. I chose short grain rice because it contains more starch than longer grain rice; hence it sticks together more easily and is perfect for sushi making.

Once the rice was cooked I just went with the directions on the package of nori. Nori, by the way, is quite nutritious. Nori is a sea vegetable that is super high in minerals, contains iron, and is one of the only vegetarian sources of B12, so it is ideal for vegans.

Rolling sushi was very therapeutic, and I got better and better as I went on. My first roll was somewhat of a disaster. I put WAY too much rice and fillings in and was a little aggressive with my rolling. The nori ripped and it was a big mess! By my fourth roll I had it down. A nice thin layer of rice, not too many veggies and, viola! Sushi!

The best thing about this sushi is that I know what is in it. It has whole food ingredients and no preservatives or sugar. It was fun to make and it sure was delicious! With all the practicing that it took to achieve sushi perfection, I ended up with enough for dinner tonight, lunch tomorrow and happy neighbors! Have any of you made sushi before? What do you like in your rolls?


4 comments:

  1. Wait a minute....I talked to you only about 4 hours ago, and you were on your way to buy the ingredients! What are you? Super Woman???? Now I'm drooling looking at the pictures of your Sushi on your blog.

    Think I'll be skipping the white rice sushi from now on!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Seriously happy neighbors! Ben chowed.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Very nice photos. Wish I could take one that wasn't blurry! It is definitely an art. The sushi looks good, too!

    ReplyDelete