How To Make Homemade Sushi

Making sushi at home is a lot more simple than it looks to be. Whenever I make this meal, all of the kids want to pitch in to help with any and all of the prep work, yes, it's THAT fun.

Have a vegetarian among the midst? No problem! Not every roll that is made has to have a meat source in them, and you can even incorporate a few slices of tofu in the roll for your protein...tada, vegetarian sushi.

All photos found on this article are ©Jolene Belmain.

There are a few things that you will need to fill your sushi rolls with. Here I have added a list of some stuff that may also be optional, but for the most part, you will need:

Sweet Rice

Nori aka seaweed

Veggies

Fish or other meat

Soy sauce

Cream cheese

Wasabi (the spicy stuff)

Ginger (this refreshes your pallet between bites)

There are a lot more items that can be incorporated into a sushi roll, but for now we will just start with a few basics.

The very first thing that you want to do is make your sweet rice. It will take about 30 minutes for the cooking and resting process, then you will need to cool your rice down for use. This takes quite a bit longer, and depending on how you intend on cooling your rice, it could take a good hour or two.

Pick out the vegetables that you want to use. The usual suspects are avocado, cucumber, carrots, but this is another one of those great recipes that can be adapted to whatever tastes you have. Some people even use fruits in their homemade sushi.

For your avocado you can use a spoon to take out the seed and to take that wonderful fruit out of the skin. It can also be peeled off with ease. Make sure you cut your avocado in half first (carefully going around the large seed inside)

Here we have smoked salmon, imitation crab meat, and shrimp. There are so many different kinds of meat you can use in a sushi roll. Tuna, eel, even some terriyaki chicken or beef (these last two would be pre-cooked of course).

Tempura sushi is great as well, although I haven't tried making any of those yet. But when I do, I'll definitely post some delicious pictures.

It's always great to have friends over while trying new things. not only can you try to learn from each other, you can also add suggestions and ideas in the process of learning.

Between the couple of group of you, you'll be able to come up with some of the best sushi in town... They just may not quite look as professional as you're used to, at least for the first few times anyway. But hey, you know what they say, practice makes perfect right?

When spreading the rice it is supposed to cover at least 3/4 of the sushi nori (maybe even a bit more), make sure to leave enough nori uncovered on the top and bottom end to be able to close your roll.

When purchasing wasabi in the store, it comes in a very small can in powdered form. From there you add bits of water until it makes a creamy paste.

There are a few things you can do with your wasabi paste. You can take it and add it into your sushi rolls (just spread it on the nori if you are putting the rice on the outside, or you can also spread it on your rice before you add your ingredients).

The most popular way to use wasabi is to add it into your soy sauce which is used for dipping your rolls in. You just take your chop sticks, fish a little bit out, and stir it around in your soy sauce until it is dissolved. The spicier you like your sauce, the more you add, and let me tell you, this stuff is pretty darn spicy.

If you are wanting a few adult drinks to have during your sushi party, sake is a traditional rice wine that is served with sushi. Our brother-in-law is a full blooded Russian who loves to have drinks with meals, friends, and family. He is the one who introduced us to our first drink of rice wine.

Some like it hot and some like it cold. A lot of people will have their Sake warmed up. We put ours into a glass bottle, heated it up in the microwave, then poured it into individual shot glasses. After every few bites, my brother-in-law would raise his shot glass up and yell "SAKE!!!!". I will warn you that it is an acquired taste... but doesn't take long to get used to.