The Best Way To Make Sushi At Home

These are the secrets to making the most popular sushi rolls at home (nigiri, hand rolls, and maki). No sushi chef required.

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Today I’m going to show you how to make the three most popular types of sushi. Niggiri, hand roll, and maki. We’ll begin by making our sushi rice. When some people think about sushi, they just think about the fish. But the rice is equally important. If you plan on making sushi, you do specifically want to buy sushi rice. The reason being, it’s got a higher starch content that will make it naturally stickier as it cooks. As with making any rice, I’m going to start off by giving it a nice rinse. Normally, I’d do this over the sink, but I’m doing it this way right now so I can demonstrate easier. We’re doing this to rinse off all the excess dust and starch from the rice. We want it sticky, but not gummy. Once I’ve given it a nice first rinse, I’m going to go ahead and bring it back to the sink. And now, we’ll just repeat this exact same process twice more or until the water runs clear. This is what your clean rice should look like. The easiest way to make your rice will be with a rice cooker. For this, we’ll add in our rice and then cover it with water along with a piece of kamboo. This is a Japanese seaweed that’s going to give our sushi rice a hint of this incredible umami flavor. Before we cook, we’re going to let this rest for 20 minutes. And while we wait, I’ll feed my fish. And now that he’s happy, here’s our soaked rice. We’ll cook our rice with the comoo still in there using the sushi rice setting on our rice cooker. While our sushi rice cooks, let’s prepare our rice seasoning. In a small pot over low heat, we’ll add some rice vinegar, sugar, and a sprinkle of salt. Mix until the salt and sugar are both fully dissolved. And once the liquid is clear, shift it off the heat and immediately add in some comoo. We’ll let this sit now until our rice is done while we prepare the rest of our ingredients. When it comes to choosing your fish, pick whatever you like best. Part of what makes sushi so special is that sushi chefs are using special particular cuts from each fillet of fish. So, very quickly, in case you ever end up with a huge sushi grade filt of fish like this, I’m going to show you how to cut these nice portions out of it. For this, all we do is find that center line that runs down the center of the fillet and make a nice clean cut all the way down. The next step is to remove the skin. You can do this part yourself or usually you can ask the person at the fish shop to do this for you. And now we’re left with a nice, clean, beautiful fillet which we can trim the ends off of. And once you’ve cleaned that up, it’ll look something like this. Here we have three beautiful cuts, including salmon, hamachi, and tuna. Then in just a few moments, we’ll use to make three different types of sushi. Now, we’re going to prepare our vegetables. We’ll begin by chopping off both ends. And then using our nori sheet as a guide, we want to cut pieces of cucumber that are about half the size of it. So, right about here. And we’re going to do that exact same thing with the rest of our ingredients. That way they fit well inside the roll. With this piece here, I’ll trim it right in half. Then flip each piece face down to cut it into quarters. We’ll want to trim out the softer part of the inside so it looks something like this. Then if you want to make them really nice and crisp, trim off the edges and then cut them into two or three pieces each depending on the size of your cucumber. With that, our cucumber slices are done. So let’s move on to our pepper. For this, we’ll trim off the top and bottom. Then slice right through the middle and then carefully slice out the middle to get two pieces like this. Then all we do now is slice into even strips. And our pepper is ready, too. As for our scallions, we’ll trim off the top and bottoms to clean them up. And then we’ll cut somewhere in between where the white and the green parts meet. And then we’ll line them up evenly like this. Chop these into nice even thin rings. And then if you want to be really professional, put them in a bowl of ice water, which will give them a better texture. These are just a few examples of how to prep certain vegetables, but you can and should use whatever ones you want. For now, let’s clear these off to the side so we can finish our sushi rice and get to making our sushi. This is called a hung giddy. It’s what you use to make sushi rice, but obviously I don’t expect any of you to have this at home. You can do this with the biggest bowl you have. To finish our sushi rice, we’ll remove our comoo and then add it to our bowl or whatever container you’re using. And then we’ll pour our vinegar mixture over our sushi rice while we wave a spoon or paddle underneath to spread it all out evenly. We’ll use that same spoon to cut through the rice and break up any clumps with the goal being that each grain of rice is going to get coated in that vinegar mixture. Once you feel your rice has been fully coated, go ahead and spread it out in a nice even layer and then wipe down all the sides with a damp kitchen towel. It should look nice and clean like this. If you want to look like a true sushi chef, go ahead and fan down your rice as well. Since it should still be quite warm at this stage, this will help to cool it down and make the rice easier to work with in just a few moments. I’m going to show you how to make three common types of sushi. The first one being nigiri, which we’re going to use this tuna for. To trim your fish for niggiri, start by trimming off the end to get a nice flat face. And then try to get nice, even slices using a clean, consistent motion that runs the entire length of your knife’s blade. At the very end of each cut, you also want to turn that knife blade down to create a ridge on each piece of fish. For our ngiri, we’re also going to prep some wasabi. And believe it or not, most times you thought you were having wasabi, it was probably horseradish. But this is the real deal. To shape the nigiri, wet both hands with some water. Grab a little bit of sushi rice about the size of a large cherry. And then place the rice in your dominant hand and grab the fish with your other hand. That ridge we created earlier should be facing down. Grab a small amount of wasabi if you even want it and spread it right into the middle of your fish. Now place down your rice. Create a small little dimple using your thumb to create air within the rice and then flip the whole thing over. Use a combination of these three fingers at once to shape the fish over the rice. And then once you’ve done that, place your thumb over the top and wrap these fingers around the fish and press just like this. It’s almost like when you’re trying to catch an egg. And to make sure it doesn’t break, you step back to catch it. You’re doing that same sort of motion with your hand and the After this, repeat those same two motions back and forth until you feel you have a nicely shaped nigiri. Moving on, we’re going to make hand rolls using this yellow tail, also known as hamachi. This is basically the sushi equivalent of an ice cream cone. For hand rolls, we’re going to cut our fish in that exact same way, except then we’re going to cut it into nice thin strips like this. Now, we’ll take half a seaweed sheet. Then, once again, grab some rice, but a little bit more this time. and then find the midpoint of your seaweed sheet and place the rice down to the left of that imaginary line. Now spread that rice out to form a triangle that moves to the lower left corner of your seaweed sheet. And then lay down your fish, making sure to get all the way to that bottom corner here in the opposite direction of the way that rice triangle goes. To finish, cover your fish with whatever topping you want. And then fold it all the way around into an ice cream cone shape like this. But try not to lose anything inside like I did while you do it. And this is your beautiful hand roll. For our third and final sushi, we’ll make maki. the good old classic roll that we all know and love. For this one, we’ll use our salmon. I’ll use one of my toppings from earlier to measure out a nice slice. And then I’ll cut this into nice long strips, each of which I’m then going to cut into smaller strips like this. They’re going to look somewhat like thick cut fish fries. To make maki, you will need a bamboo roller like this one. And you’re going to want to wrap it up in plastic wrap so it’s non-stick. We’ll add a half a sheet of seaweed towards the lower part of our roller. Then we’ll grab a ball of rice about the size of a clementine. And then starting from the top left of our nori, we’ll shape it out in a log like this. Now, using your hand as a guide, begin spreading the rice down the nori. We don’t want to mash the rice when we do this. You want to be gentle, and the goal is to get that rice all the way down with a small little strip of seaweed here at the end. Next, sprinkle on a few sesame seeds. Then, flip it over and add your fish right in the middle, as well as any additional toppings you want. Then, lift up your bamboo roller, holding all the fillings in place. Roll it most of the way over and lift the edge so that you can finish the motion all the way through. To finish, pinch your fingers at the very bottom and place your fingers on top. Then slide with even pressure all the way out. And before you cut it, place it on your work surface and then give it one last push on either side to clean it up. To make sure the roll doesn’t stick, you should also lightly wet the top of your work surface like this. And then place it down to cut. To cut your roll, find the midpoint and then slice. Wipe your knife on a damp towel. Then stack the rolls. Cut through the middle again. Wipe your knife. And repeat the same thing with both halves. And congratulations, you just made maki. If you want to get real fancy, you can even add things like salmon eggs on top. And that’s how you make sushi. at home. Would it be messed up to let my fish try the sushi? [Music]