If you thought sushi art was difficult!

My 8 year old went to a Japanese restaurant and instantly fell in love with the food. I couldn't quite appreciate the taste at once though, but now we love it and its a weekly dish for us. The popularity of the food is definitely growing as you can find fusion dishes, you can find sushi rolls with Arabic and Lebanese flavors like falafel, zatar etc.

Since its now a frequent food for us, eventually I tried it at home. Today I will share the recipe for most popular sushi rolls.Though, some of the other popular vegetarian Japanese dishes are Edamame ( the green sweet pea pod), Maki rolls ( Nori sheets or seaweed sheets rolled with  rice and flavoring ), tofu katsu curry ( tofu made in a curry- the sauce is very typical and is called katsu- served with rice), firecracker rice ( its kind of fried rice- Japanese rice with vegetables and a 7 spice flavor called shichimi togarashi) and Yakisoba ( Japanese noodles with vegetables). Japanese usually have very small servings and you would see the same at restaurants. 


Collect all the ingredients , make the rice and you are ready to roll. Japanese rice is cooked like any other rice but takes a bit longer as has to be washed several times. Wash the rice until the water runs clear. Soak the rice for 30 min in cold water. Usually you would need 3 parts water to 2 parts rice. Bring it to boil first and then cover and cook for about 10-12 min or until tender. 

For Sushi rolls, cooked rice is then flavored with rice wine vinegar and salt and sugar. So in 1 cup rice- around 2 tbs vinegar, 2 tbs sugar and 1 tsp salt. Adjust to taste. Let the rice cool down in a wooden bowl before you can start rolling. Wooden works best as it absorbs any extra moisture from rice.

Now, take the Nori sheets and spread rice evenly. Spread some wasabi sauce(its kind of harsh Japanese hot sauce)if you like to make it hot. Put the slit vegetables length wise on one side and roll the sheets using a bamboo sheet. Cut horizontally into desired thickness- about 2 cm. Sprinkle shichimi togarashi and some black and white sesame seeds. Serve cold or at room temperature with Gari(pickled ginger), wasabi sauce and soy sauce. It can also be stored in refrigerator for couple of days if kept away immediately and wrapped in freezer wrap tightly. 

Ingredients required

• Bamboo sheet for rolling the maki rolls- you just need to get them once
• Cucumber/avacado/bell pepper/carrot- your choice of vegetables, thinly sliced length wise in 3-4 inches.
• 1/4  cup Rice- Rice almost doubles after cooking
• Nori sheets- One Nori sheet will use about 1/4 cup uncooked rice and will make about 7-8 rolls.
• Rice Vinegar- you can buy a small bottle and reuse later.
• Wasabi sauce- you can buy in dry powder form and store it. Mix water in amount required.
• Soy sauce
• Gari-pickled ginger- can be stored in refrigerator.

As you can see, once the rice is cooked, you can roll sushi rolls. You can also make fire cracker rice. Just toss with cooked mixed diced vegetables ( onion, carrot, bell pepper, mushrooms, any of your choice), add 1-2 tbsp soy sauce and use the flavoring shichimi togarashi. Pretty much how we do fried rice.

Try it out. I find it very interesting.