How to Make Sushi on a Whim with Absolutely No Experience or Idea What You're Doing

Aaron and I are pretty fond of sushi. By that, I mean we have it for lunch or dinner about once a week. Don't be fooled though. We are pretty simple sushi people...California and Philly rolls are how we roll.

We got a little inspired one night, and made our own. So, here is How to Make Sushi on a Whim with Absolutely No Experience or Idea What You're Doing:

1. Watched some videos.
This being decidedly the shortest and simplest:

Then we realized we didn't know how to make sushi rice...so we watched this one too:

2. Create a grocery list and purchased goods.

For the Rice:
- rice
- sugar
- salt
- vinegar
- dashi? (which we could not find at Walmart)

For the Sushi:
- sushi roller board
- seaweed sheets
- cucumber
- avacado
- crab meat
- cream cheese
- salmon


In case you didn't know.
California Rolls = cucumber + avacado + crab meat
Philly Rolls = cucumber + avacado + salmon + cream cheese

3. Prepare the Rice and Fillings. Aaron steamed the rice and prepared the vinegar/sugar/salt solution and then help me cut the cucumber, avacado, crab, salmon and cream cheese into long, thin strips.

** After we tried the rolls, we found they were a little vinegary. Maybe it was our lack of "dashi" ...whatever that is? But you may look into another sushi rice recipe or tweeking the one in the video?

He's really more of a pretty face than a chef...

4. Spread the Rice. Once the rice was ready, we enclosed the roller board in a large ziplock bag and spread the sticky rice into a flat layer on the seaweed sheets.

This was a little tricky. We found it helps to spray Pam on your hands
and also to let me do it and not Aaron.

5. Roll the Sushi. Place the fillings on the rice spread and using the roller board, conceal the fillings tightly in a roll. This part is also tricky. If you watch the first video you can see how pulling the roller towards yourself as you wrap it around the sushi creates pressure on the roll and makes it a little tighter.

 
6. Cut the Sushi Roll into Strips. Again, use of the Pam spray on your knife will help your cuts be cleaner.

Otherwise, you'll get rolls like Aaron. Fail.

Be a pro, like me.

7. Eat the Rolls! Nom nom. What a delight.

We even bought some weird, orange Asian drink
and fortune cookies so we could be reeeeeally authentic.

8. Instagram a Picture. Obviously...if you don't take a picture it's like it never happened.