Vegetarian Sushi

It would be safe to say that my all-time favorite food is sushi.  Well, everyone knows that pregnant women shouldn’t eat sushi because of 1) bacteria from being stored improperly and 2) mercury levels in fish.  So you can probably imagine how much I have missed sushi during all three of my pregnancies.  I’m almost done with my third one (about 8 weeks to go!) but I decided I just couldn’t wait any longer – I was going to make my own sushi!

Because I’m pregnant, I wanted to stay away from raw fish, so I made vegetarian sushi.  I was really surprised at how easy it was to make the sushi.  I’m definitely going to be making my own again, and soon!

To help guide me, I had this 5-star recipe from Recipezaar and this beginner sushi tutorial from And Then I Do The Dishes printed out.

So basically what I have done with my sushi is thinly slice seedless cucumbers and carrots, which was actually the hardest part of making my sushi!  To make it easier, see if you can find matchstick carrots in the produce section of your store, or maybe even grated carrots.  The cucumbers weren’t so difficult.  I also sliced the avocado and extra firm tofu a bit thicker.

Rolling the sushi took a little practice – my first roll didn’t turn out so well, but the second looked better.  I think I overstuffed my sushi a bit, because the seaweed started to rip in some places!  I don’t have a bamboo sushi mat, but I do have silicone pot holders/hot plates, so I used one of those.  It’s about a 6-inch square mat, and it worked really well.

I spread about 1 cup of sushi rice on top of a sheet of nori.  You’ll need to have a bowl of water right next to you to dip your fingers into as you spread the rice evenly on top of the nori, otherwise you’ll end up with the rice stuck to you instead of the nori!  After spreading the rice, I placed the tofu, cucumbers, carrots and avocado in a line down the center of the rice.  Then I started rolling.  Like I said, that takes a little bit of practice, but after the first roll I pretty much got the hang of it.

If you are interested in making your own sushi, I highly recommend doing so.  It’s really not as difficult as you might think.  The post at And Then I Do The Dishes really helped me out with this, so have a read over that, print it out and get to work!  :)