Sunday, January 25, 2009

Sushi Challenge!


Making your own sushi at home isn't as difficult as it may seem! There are a few things you will need in order to make a spicy tuna cut roll, tuna sashimi and hot sake :)

#1 Fresh sushi grade tuna (I went to a Japanese market to get this- there are a strip of them at Sawtelle just above Olympic if you live in LA)
#2 SHORT grain rice
#3 Rice vinegar
#4 A Sushi rolling mat
#5 A SHARP knife
#6 A few sheets of nori (the seaweed)
#7 Sriracha sauce (the Japanese red hot sauce)
#8 Sake (made for hot NOT cold) and the sake holder with glasses

Firstly Sushi means cooked rice, not raw fish as many people think. Therefore the emphasis is on the sticky rice and the preparation it goes through in order to be used in sushi. Here is the recipe for the rice:

Ingredients:


2 cups sushi or short grain rice (yields 4 cups of rice)

2 cups water, plus extra for rinsing rice

2 tablespoons rice vinegar

2 tablespoons sugar

1 tablespoon kosher salt

Place the rice into a mixing bowl and cover with cool water. Swirl the rice in the water, pour off and repeat 2 to 3 times or until the water is clear.

Place the rice and 2 cups of water into a medium saucepan and place over high heat. Bring to a boil, uncovered. Once it begins to boil, reduce the heat to the lowest setting and cover. Cook for 15 minutes. Remove from the heat and let stand, covered, for 10 minutes.

Combine the rice vinegar, sugar and salt in a small bowl and heat in the microwave on high for 30 to 45 seconds. Transfer the rice into a large wooden or glass mixing bowl and add the vinegar mixture. Fold thoroughly to combine and coat each grain of rice with the mixture. Allow to cool to room temperature before using to make sushi or sashimi.

Now you've finished with the rice next comes the Spicy tuna.

You are going to want to slice the skin off the side so you have a nice piece of tuna steak like the above picture. Now separate your slices of sashimi from the rest of the steak. Keep those in the refrigerator for later. The rest of the tuna will be used for the spicy tuna mixture.

Ingredients:

2 tablespoons mayonnaise

1 tablespoon of sriracha hot chili sauce

2 teaspoons of hot chili oil

1/2 to 1 lbs of tuna (the less tuna the more spicy the tuna will be)

2-3 green onion stocks (the white and light green part only)

Directions:

Dice the tuna in tiny pieces (this will take a while)

Chop the green onions

Combine the onions and tuna and keep chopping until they are in tiny pieces

Put the tuna in a bowl and combine the chili oil, mayonnaise and sriracha sauce, mix thoroughly until combined. The more you mash together the less chunky the tuna will be in the sushi.

The tuna should be a nice pink color- feel free to taste it and add more sriracha or more mayonnaise according to your tastes.

Next it is time to roll your sushi rolls! Here is a great tutorial video showing you what to do. Adding avocado slices to the sides of you tuna is a yummy addition!


Nigiri: Nigiri sushi are pieces of sashimi with a drop wasabi underneath them and over rice balls.

Next take your slices of Sashimi and roll small rice balls (should be a bit smaller than your tuna pieces) Put a drop of wasabi on the bottom side of your sashimi and spread them out over the rice balls.

My rice balls (pictured above) were a little to large for my sashimi. But it didn't make them taste any worse!

The last part is your hot sake.

Firstly you will need a Sake carafe and saki glasses. There are 2 different types of saki, saki meant to be drank warm or sake meant to be drank cold. Cold sake is more expensive and finer quality, therefore you do not want to drink it warm because it would be a waste. Hot sake can be as cheap as 4 dollars a bottle because it is usually unfiltered, but the warming process brings out the flavor and the alcohol.

Here is some great information about Sake (pronounced sah-keh).

So if you choose to have hot sake first you need to boil a pot of water. Once its boiled pour the sake into the carafe. Then rest the carafe in the boiling hot water. Next you are going to have to watch the sake and make sure it doesn't boil (otherwise you lose the alcoholic properties). This shouldn't take more than a few minutes. Once you think it is ready take the sake carafe out of the water and it is ready to serve!

どうぞめしあがれ (pronounced douzo meshiagare) meaning: Enjoy your meal!

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