For all those who guessed that I was making some kind of sushi rolls yesterday that is indeed what I was doing. I can make Maki Sushi, which is the sushi which uses the Nori seaweed rolls wrapped around rice, fish and vegetables.

I know how to make california type rolls and also shrimp and crab rolls and it was a combination of those which I made yesterday. I thought I would write out how I do these things so that people who are curious have an idea as to the steps.
I don’t trust myself with a variety raw fish at home. I’ll go out and get that elsewhere. It’s a shame because I LOVE-LOVE eel and salmon rolls, but I’m too paranoid. You can also make sushi rolls with just veggies. There are some really good ones which are combinations of cream cheese, carrots, cucumber, avocado and so on.

Firstly ingredients:
Nori seaweed wraps
Rice Vinegar
Water
Rice (I use jasmine rice, but you can get “sushi” rice from most grocery stores. Any short grain rice works best)
Crab/Imitation crab meat
Tempura shrimp
Cucumber.
Cream Cheese
(You can also use avocado in the shrimp rolls but I couldn’t find any good avocado at the store).

How to go about it:

The friend who first showed me how to make sushi recommended a rice cooker and I wholeheartedly agree. It’s so easy to make sure that you get enough rice, and that it cooks to the consistency you need without having to hover over the pot all the time. That way you can prep the rest of your ingredients and be ready to go once the rice is cooked.
Rice cookers come with these nifty measuring cups which are perfect for sorting out how much rice you need. I used two cups of rice and two cups of water and a cup of rice vinegar, and that was enough rice to make five sushi rolls.

While the rice was cooking I peeled some of the rind of half a cucumber and chopped it into thin strips, then chopped the crab meat into halves. I also put four of the shrimp tempura pieces in the oven to warm up, that took about 12 minutes at 350. I also made some thin slices of cream cheese as well, and then washed my knives off.

I had a very good tip that it’s best to keep your knife warm and slightly wet when trying to slice through sushi rolls because it helps to stop the seaweed wraps sticking to the knife and makes it a lot easier to cut.

Once the shrimp was cooked I let it cool for a little while as the rice was almost ready. Here you see the wrap laid out on a sushi mat. Those are supposed to help make it easier for you to roll and shape the sushi but I’ve yet to be able to work that out. I find it easier just to roll the sushi itself. If anyone has any tips on rolling with the mat I’d be happy to hear them.

It’s important to remember to put the sushi wrap shiny side down.

Once the rice was cooked, fluffy and sticking together I laid it out on the sushi wrap. You lay the rice out to the edge of the wrap on three sides, but leave some empty wrap at the bottom so that the wrap will stick together. Then about a third of the way down you lay the ingredients. In the picture below I have crab, cucumber and cream cheese to make the california like rolls. With the shrimp rolls I just used shrimp and cream cheese for one, and shrimp, crab and cream cheese for the other as I had crab meat left over.

Once everything is laid out you roll the wrap up together, until it’s stuck like the one below. This is the shrimp and cream cheese roll. Then after running my knife under the hot tap for a little while I sliced the sushi into pieces, each somewhere between a half inch and three-quarters of inch in width.

Here’s the first california roll and the shrimp and cream cheese roll. I wound up making two more california rolls and the shrimp and crab roll. They’re very yummy even if I do say so myself.

What’s anyone else’s favorite kinds of sushi?

I love to eat the shrimp rolls especially fresh off the press because the shrimp is still slightly warm and it just melts in your mouth. I like eel rolls, and eel and cream cheese is just divine, but I haven’t tried to make those myself yet.

It’s good to serve sushi with pickled ginger and wasabi, but I need to learn how to make wasabi paste properly. Usually I cheat and get it from the grocery store, but it’s not very spicy. It’s good to serve sushi with soy sauce and mix in a little wasabi to taste and then dip the rolls in there.