Making Sushi with Gillian
Since Gillian has been diagnosed with Celiac disease, we’ve been trying to find ways to get her to eat more diverse foods than gluten free(gf) mac and cheese and gf grilled cheese and grilled chicken. I knew enough to download a translated card from the Celiac Disease foundation that listed the instructions and asked a few questions in several languages so the guys at our japanese restaurant could understand and make her sushi. They did, and she loved it.
Problem is, it’s really expensive. So for the holidays, Gillian bought me a sushi kit – a book, some implements and a wish to make it with me. I’m gonna say no to that face? Don’t think so.
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First things first. Pour the rice into a big bowl that isn’t white. Why not white? The first thing you have to do is make sure that you rinse the rice to pull off any excess starch and ‘dust’. Put the rice into the bowl and put in water so it’s totally submerged and then some. |
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You’ll need to mix it around so you get all of it ‘clean’. Gillian kinda liked this part  |
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Once it’s relatively clear, you’re good to go. Drop it in the rice cooker. If you don’t have one, google what you’ll need to do. My roomie from college gave me the one we used and we love it. |
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Gillian likes cooked shrimp so we decided on a cucumber, mango, and shrimp roll. Yeah, she’s nuts for mango. The key to cooking the shrimp is to use wooden skewers. You slide it into the shrimp, trying to keep it inside the shell, but not piercing the shrimp itself. The skewers are so when you cook them, they don’t curl up. Curled shrimp is pretty freakin hard to put in a roll from what I hear. We got jumbo shrimp from the Wegmans counter, so they were iced, but not frozen. Get them de-veined too. eww. |
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If you’ve eaten at enough sushi places and watched them (plus a lot of Iron Chef), you know that you don’t chop up the cucumber. You pare it like you’re peeling an apple, just make it one continuous sheet of cucumber. I managed to get 3/4 of the cuke peeled like this before I broke it Gillian peeled the skin off initially and then sliced the sheet into strips, of course eating the ones that were too thick  |
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For those of you who have made sushi before, I know, this looks really sloppy. KEY NOTE TO MAKING SUSHI – WAIT FOR THE RICE TO COOL. I almost burned all the skin off the tips of my fingers spreading this out. Hot sushi also tends to melt or tear the nori. Here we have the bamboo mat with a sheet of nori (seaweed) on top spread with the rice. Don’t do it all the way to the edge, leave about 1/5 of the roll free so you don’t have too much. Another key note – spread it thin or it’ll be one big ball of rice. The other thing I learned is that my ingredients are too close to the middle, needed to bring them towards me a bit more. |
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Here’s my first roll, cut into pieces. Key Note: hot/warm rice doesn’t cut well. Also: having a container with 4 parts water, 1 part rice-wine vinegar that you can dip the knife into is ESSENTIAL. As you can see, it’s not cut well here. Knife was plenty sharp, I was pushing down too hard, and the rice got too sticky on the knife. |
| The first roll is finished: Matt & Gillian make sushi from Matt Cushing on Vimeo. |
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As you can tell by the thumbs up, I got better as I went along |
| We’re done: We’re done making Sushi from Matt Cushing on Vimeo. |
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All in all, lots of fun, and something we’ll definitely do again
January 22nd, 2010 at 7:36 am
My sister sent me some sushi-making supplies and I have a slab of ahi tuna in the freezer. I’m hoping to try that out soon. Looks like fun AND a lot of work!
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January 22nd, 2010 at 10:23 am
it was quite a bit of work and a big mess, but it was a LOT of fun.
.-= M@´s last blog ..Making Sushi with Gillian =-.
January 22nd, 2010 at 10:43 am
I’ve been making my own sushi for a while. It eventually becomes less work and mess.
I also found that the leftover rice is even easier to work with because it gets stickier, and you can use it when it’s cold.
The slicing thing – it works better if you make sure you use a REALLY sharp knife, and then don’t push the knife at ALL. Let the knife kind of slide through the roll. (And, yeah, having your hands and the knife be wet when handling the rice helps, too.)
Now I’m in the mood for sushi. Maybe I’ll make some tonight. By the way, if you like brown rice, find “brown sweet rice” which is a short grain brown rice. Cook it like you do sushi rice and you can make brown rice rolls.
January 22nd, 2010 at 12:48 pm
How fun to see you two together in the video! Hope you have a great weekend, Matt!
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January 22nd, 2010 at 10:48 pm
Even though I know that Sushi is not raw fish, I kept expecting to see it. That looks really good! Still think I need to try it in a restaurant before attempting it at home though.
Loved this post, and the videos were especially fun. Gillian is SO cute. You’re in trouble with that one, you know!
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January 23rd, 2010 at 12:25 am
A – yeah, figured out the ‘do not push’ thing on the second roll.
Or shrimp roll which is what we made.
C – it was a lot of fun. Fae told me we were at it almost 3 hours preparing and just enjoying it. prolly going to make more tomorrow.
T – take a walk on the wild side, give it a shot. Start with California roll, it’s not raw
.-= M@´s last blog ..Making Sushi with Gillian =-.
January 26th, 2010 at 5:06 pm
awesome, I have a friend who has two kids and a husband with celiac. She is intermixed with a huge network online of folks with resouces to share. I am sure you are too. Love the sushi idea!
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