I keep forgetting how much I dislike making sushi rice. I don't have one of those hangiri things to put it in after it's done cooking so I always have to come up with some cockeyed plan to mix it up and then I get frustrated and I end up making Scott do it. He does a good job, though. :P
In the bottom tier: inarizushi with konbu and sushi rice filling, tsukemono, flower carrot cutouts, and tamago nigirizushi. In the top tier: strawberry slices and blueberries, steamed broccoli with mini star carrot cutouts, and renkon (lotus root) with dried red pepper.
Nutritional Info lime version: 480 calories 1.5 grams saturated fat ~790 mg sodium 18 grams protein 75 grams carbs
Inarizushi is usually just sushi rice inside aburaage, which is a deep-fried tofu pouch. When you get them in a restaurant the bottoms are closed. I don't know how to do that so I just use them as pouches. I am not a fan of sushi rice by itself (as in not part of maki or nigirizushi) so I like to mix stuff into the sushi rice before stuffing the inari. Today the filling is just stewed konbu with sesame seeds and chopped up carrot. I got the idea for adding the carrot from Just Bento (hahaha, I just noticed the most recent post on Maki's page is hijiki-stuffed inari...great minds think alike, I guess) but I use stewed konbu by itself all the time in onigiri because it's Scott's favorite. Like Maki said, you can make them healthier by using brown sushi rice but I'm out of brown rice right now. I made the inari and the nigiri part of the tamagozushi last night and refrigerated them, then heated them in the microwave briefly before packing this morning. There is no way I am going to be coordinated enough to make sushi in the morning, ever. Heh.
The tamagozushi is just a piece of dashi-flavored tamago sashimi on top of a small mound of sushi rice and held together with a thin strip of nori. It's not as sweet as the kind I usually make. I do not use a recipe anymore because I've made it about 100 times, but this one is pretty close to what I do. Make the omelette and then slice it to your desired thickness and wrap a thin strip of nori around it to keep it together.
Renkon is my favorite root vegetable. It's gorgeous and the consistency is chewier/not as fibrous as most other root veggies. This okazu is from Naomi Kijima's book, Bento Boxes. Basically it's just renkon, vinegar (I used apple cider vinegar so it changed the color of the renkon a tiny bit...use white if you want your dish to stay as white as possible), water, sugar, and a little salt along with the renkon and dried red pepper rings. It only takes about 5 minutes to make.
The tsukemono is from Uwajimaya. It's cucumber and eggplant pickled with akajiso (red perilla leaf) to turn it that bright purple color. You can make your own version of this with a pickle press and the right ingredients. Uwajimaya often carries pickle presses and I have also seen them on Amazon.
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umistudio) wrote,
