Muchacho Polaco

Yunuen picked me up from work yesterday and as we traveled home south on Craycroft, we passed an Asian market on the East side of Craycroft (just before the intersection with Golf Links). We decided to turn around and check it out.

We ended up purchasing everything needed to make some sushi rolls and so this morning I decided to make some rolls for breakfast!

Above are the items we purchased to complete this experiment.  From the left to right: Korean sushi rice, a sushi rolling mat, Yama Moto Yama roasted seaweed, and S&B wasabi.

Step 1 is to begin making the rice as it takes the longest. I used a rice cooker that my mom bought me over a decade ago while in college. It still works like a charm and we use it a lot. I put 1 cup of rice to a cup and a half of water. The rice smelled a little funky initially, but that eventually went away and it tasted great.

Step 2 was to prepare the contents of the rolls. In this case, I couldn’t find anything in the house that I would normally find in a roll. I was hoping to make cucumber rolls, but since we didn’t have any, I cut up some carrots instead. Having no instruction, I cut them wrong. As the photo above shows, they are way too short. They should have been double or triple that in length, but the thickness was appropriate.

Step 3 was to roll out the bamboo mat and lay down the dried seaweed nori (with the shiny side down). The instructions were to lay 2 cups of cooked rice, but I had no idea to measure the quantity of rice, so I just added 75% of the rice from the rice cooker. This seemed to be an appropriate amount of rice.

I became aware at Step 4 that I had cut the carrots wrong. They should be as long as the roll is wide, which ultimately would have made my rolls a lot cleaner looking. At any rate, this is the stage where you add your contents.

Step 6 is to roll everything up. This was the trickiest part of the project for me. This is where I came to find that the size of my rolls was mostly proportionate to the amount of rice I had placed on the nori in Step 3. The next time I do this, I will add less rice which I suspect will make the rolling process and cutting process a lot more manageable. Fortunately, the nori is really sticky, so the ends somewhat glue together.

Step 7 is to cut the roll into individual pieces. This is where I realized I do not own one decent (ie, sharp) knife. You definately don’t want to use a seraded knife, but a dull knife isn’t much better as each work more like a saw and will somewhat rip the thing apart as you’re attempting to cut it. Somehow I managed.

Step 8 is to eat it! As you can see, my rolls were pretty sloppy looking. If I had used less rice, perhaps they would have stuck together better. If I had cut the carrots the appropriate length, they may have likewise given a better appearance. The plate on the right is the soy sauce and wasabi.  I decided on the prepared wasabi from the tube as opposed to the paste which you mix, in part because the price was comparable and I wanted less work. It’s technically not wasabi though. Wasabi is very rare and very expensive, but it is the same green mush made from colored horseradish that you get at any sushi restaurant.

Despite their ugly appearance and the unusual use of  carrots, these rolls were really quite good!  Yunuen and I went out for sushi in Mexico a few months ago and they had jalapeno rolls – so perhaps that will be incorporated in the next attempt.

Yunuen and I went out for some Sachiko sushi and some Hakusuru sake! Sachiko is less than a mile from our house, so despite being overpriced, we go there fairly frequently. I am a big fan of sushi and eat it to excess. I figure it is healthy, so the more I eat, the more healthy I’ll be!

I really enjoy the sake too – it’s an enjoyable compliment to raw fish. Sapporo is good stuff too.