Making sushi is super satisfying! It’s daunting at first, but when you get the hang of it, it becomes a really cool thing to make at home. I’m certainly no sushi master, and I have a love and appreciation for the art of sushi making, but a home version really is something you can take on and have fun with. The hardest part of sushi making is making sure you have a super sharp knife and learning how to cut the fish, especially for nigiri. I still don’t get it right a lot of the time, but who’s judging! Making sure you get sushi grade fish is critical of course.
The best way to learn sushi making is to watch some you tube videos on how to cut fish, how to roll the maki rolls etc, there are a ton of resources out there. One tip I learned is to make the half sheet rolls for making maki, not the full sheet version, I just find them easier and more manageable.
Have fun with it, you get to decide what you want to make the perfect combo! A few of my favorites are hamachi scallion rolls, spicy tuna rolls (it’s literally tuna, mayo and sriracha!), salmon avocado rolls.. and one tuna, avocado and scallions!
When making nigiri a couple of tips I learned along the way (after a few mistakes) were:
- Always rinse your sushi rice really well and make it in a rice maker – its just easier!
- When rice is cooked take some of it out and place into a large shallow bowl like a salad bowl and sprinkle on the sushi seasoning – don’t overdo the seasoning or else it will be too much vinegar taste
- When you are shaping the rice for nigiri, resist the temptation to use too much rice, start small
- When shaping, make sure your hands are damp, have a bowl of water handy, otherwise the rice sticks to your hands
- I place a smidgen of wasabi onto of the rice and under the fish – just put a little on your finger and swipe it over the rice!
Here’s a sampling of some sushi fun!
close up not he rolls, with black and white sesame seeds on the outside. Some shishito peppers which I fry in a wok by spraying a tiny bit of olive oil in the wok (buy the spray oil for this, it’s awesome when you only need a smidgen), I fry them up with a little soy sauce too.
I always loved to drink sake or beer with sushi until we went to Japan and tried it with whisky – Japanese whisky is so delicious and so good with sushi!
There are a ton of different types of Japan’s ginger you can get online and in the stores, they are all pretty good, but this one we use by the ginger people is outstanding! So good we put it in our pantry page!
