Easy and Delicious Sushi You Can Make at Home [RECIPE]

Sushi is one of my favorite things to eat when my family and I hit up local Asian restaurants, but depending on what kind of roll you get, it can get pricey. Fortunately, making it at home is cheaper, and can be just as good.

We don't make a ton of sushi at our house, as the prep time is a bit time consuming with cooking the rice, and chopping the ingredients into thin strips so it's easy to put together once you get to that stage.

One of the other advantages of homemade sushi is that it gives even the pickiest eaters the opportunity to customize their roll with whatever ingredients they want. For example, we like to put carrots and zucchini in ours, but I have one kid who doesn't like zucchini, so they can leave it out while the other one puts it in. Everybody's happy! (And isn't that what we all want?)

There are a couple of tools you don't necessarily need to make sushi, but they will make things easier, and those are a bamboo mat and a rice paddle. Fortunately, you can pick up a kit that has both for about $12.00 at Walmart. Local grocery stores like Schnuck's will carry them as well. The paddle makes scooping and spreading the rice a bit easier, while the bamboo mat will make rolling the finished product WAY easier.

Here's your shopping list:

• Sushi Rice (different from standard white rice, and should be labeled as "Sushi Rice")
• Seaweed Wraps (Also known as "Nori". Found in the Ethnic Foods aisle.)
• Choice of vegetables, ideally something you can easily julienne or cut into thin strips.
• Cream cheese (optional)
• Choice of meat (we like imitation crab)
• 1/2 cup Rice vinegar
• 1 Tablespoon Vegetable Oil
• 1/4 cup sugar
• 1 teaspoon salt

We don't get fancy at our house. You won't find deep-fried soft shell crab, or anything like that. The rolls we make most closely resemble a standard California Roll, but you can get as creative, or as plain as you'd like.

Let the prep begin.

First things first, start cooking your rice according to package directions as this will take a bit of time especially if you're cooking quite a bit.

While your rice is cooking, mix together the final four ingredients above and cook over medium heat until the sugar completely dissolves. Transfer to a small bowl, or pitcher and allow to cool. 

Now it's time to prep your veggies, meat, and cheese by either slicing them, or using a julienne slicer. Whichever you choose, you want everything to be the size of a matchstick.

Once your rice is cooked, transfer it to an appropriate sized bowl and drizzle the dressing over it, using the rice paddle or a spoon to evenly distribute it throughout the rice.

Now that you have everything sliced and your rice dressed, it's time to roll!

It should be noted that sushi rice is far stickier than standard rice. However, Rice Vinegar briefly cuts through it's adhesiveness so have a small bowl nearby to dip your fingers in so all the rice doesn't stick to your hands.

If you have a bamboo mat, lay it out on a flat surface and place one sheet of Nori on top with the shiny side facing down. If you don't have the mat, a piece of wax paper or parchment paper will do the trick (something that won't stick to the Nori). Grab a decent size wad of rice and spread it across the Nori leaving a little space around the edges as pictured below.

Now, lay your ingredients across the edge of the rice closest to you. We use carrots, zucchini, avocado, cream cheese, and imitation crab. As you can see in the photo below, I used the carrot, zucchini, and cream cheese as the base layer, then placed the avocado and imitation crab on top.

Now it's time to physically roll your roll. Grab the edge of the bamboo mat closest to you and pull it away from you making sure to not let the mat curl into the roll. After roughly one and a half rolls, gently squeeze along the roll to pack it in tight.

Continue rolling away from you, gently squeezing one or two more times until the roll is complete. The leading edge of the mat should be laying across the roll almost to the point where you've completely flipped it over. When you're done, it should (ideally) look like this:

Take a straight-edge knife (a serrated one will rip and tear everything up) and dip the tip into the rice vinegar, holding the knife straight up afterward to let the vinegar cover the entire blade, and slice you're roll into individual pieces. For best results, dip the knife into the vinegar before each slice. Serve with your favorite dipping sauce, and enjoy!