Homemade sushi maki: vinegared rice, salmon, cucumber and avocado
Sushi is decided entirely by the rice: rinsed until the water runs clear, cooked under a closed lid, rested for ten minutes and dressed with vinegar cut through it with a spatula rather than stirred. The rest is four rolls shaped on a mat and cut with a wet knife. Buy raw fish labelled sushi-grade, or freeze it yourself for at least 7 days at −20 °C; the details are in the fish step and in the tips.
Your own work in that: 1 h 5 min.
- Rice: rinsing and cooking 25 min
- Rice resting 10 min
- Dressing and cooling 15 min
- Rolling and cutting 25 min
Step by step
0 / 7 doneRinse the rice until the water runs clear
Cover the rice with cold water in a bowl, swirl it with your hand for 20 seconds and pour the milky water away. Repeat 5–6 times, until the water is almost clear. Drain in a sieve and leave 10 minutes.
Ingredients: 300 g sushi rice · 360 ml water · 60 ml rice vinegar · 30 g sugar · 1 tsp salt
TipThe milky water is loose surface starch rubbed off during polishing. Left in, it glues the rice into a single mass in which no separate grains show, and the roll crushes under the knife. It is the commonest reason home sushi turns out like paste.
Five or six rinses, until the water runs clearCook it and rest it under the lid
Put the rice and the measured water in a pot with a heavy, tight lid. Bring to the boil, turn the heat to its lowest and cook 12 minutes. Take off the heat and leave 10 minutes without lifting the lid.
TipThose ten minutes are not a pause but part of the cooking: the steam trapped in the pot reaches the centre of every grain and evens out the moisture. Lifting the lid lets it escape and leaves hard cores that cannot be fixed afterwards.
Twelve minutes cooking, ten under the lidDress the rice, cutting with a spatula
Warm the vinegar, sugar and salt, stirring, only until they dissolve (don't boil). Tip the hot rice into a wide, shallow dish, pour the dressing over the back of a spatula so it spreads evenly, and cut through the rice with the spatula at an angle, turning the layers over, until it is absorbed. Cool to body temperature, fanning, 15 minutes.
TipCutting, not stirring. A circular motion crushes the grains and releases starch, turning the rice into a sticky mass. The edge of the spatula separates the grains so each absorbs the dressing on its own. The rice must be lukewarm: cold, it crumbles and won't hold a roll; hot, it cooks the fish and softens the nori.
Dressing over the spatula, a cutting motionPrepare the fish — and read this first
Buy raw fish for sushi only if it is labelled sushi-grade or sashimi, from a source you trust. If you have none, freeze fresh salmon at −20 °C or below for at least 7 days (check that your freezer gets that cold; many home freezers only hold −18 °C) and thaw it in the fridge. Freezing kills parasite larvae; freshness alone does not. Cut the fish with a sharp knife into 1 cm strips, the cucumber into seedless batons, the avocado into slices. Pregnant women, young children and anyone immunocompromised should eat only the cooked version — see the tips.
Ingredients: 6 pcs nori sheets · 250 g sushi-grade salmon, or salmon frozen 7 days at −20 °C · 1 pcs cucumber · 1 pcs avocado
TipKeep the fish in the fridge until the last moment and take it out only once the rice is dressed and cooled. Cutting with a sharp knife in a single stroke, rather than sawing, leaves a smooth surface on which the freshness of the flesh is visible.
One-centimetre strips, one stroke of the knifeLay out the nori and rice
Wrap the mat in cling film. Put a nori sheet shiny side down, rough side up. Wet your hands with water and a splash of vinegar and spread about 180 g of rice in a thin, even layer, leaving 2 cm of bare nori along the far edge. Don't press it down. Across the near third lay strips of salmon, cucumber and avocado.
TipThe 2 cm of bare nori is the roll's seal: moistened as you close it, it sticks to the rice. Rice spread over the whole sheet pushes the filling out and the roll comes apart. Wet hands are the simplest way to keep the rice sticking to the nori instead of your fingers.
Thin, even, a two-centimetre free edgeRoll with the mat
Lift the near edge of the mat and fold it over the filling so the nori meets the rice beyond it. Squeeze the mat along its whole length to shape a cylinder, then roll on and squeeze once more. Wet the free edge with a finger dipped in water and press it shut. Set the roll seam down and make the other three.
TipA roll is squeezed twice: once right after the first fold, to compact the filling, and again after closing, to bond the rice to the nori. A loosely rolled maki falls apart under the knife however sharp it is.
Fold over, squeeze, seal the edgeCut with a wet knife
Take the longest knife you own, dip it in water before every cut and wipe it to just damp. Halve the roll, then cut each half into three: 6 pieces per roll, 24 in all. Cut in one smooth motion, drawing the knife towards you, without pressing. Serve at once, with soy sauce and sesame.
Ingredients: 100 ml soy sauce · 2 tbsp sesame seeds
TipRice clings to dry steel and tears the roll; water gives the blade a film to slide on. Sushi is eaten the same day — refrigerated rice hardens and loses its texture within hours, and raw fish is not kept for later.
A wet knife, one stroke, six pieces per roll
Before you start
Safety: raw fish
Eat raw only fish sold as sushi-grade or frozen at −20 °C or below for at least 7 days. A home freezer that only holds −18 °C gives no such certainty: in that case buy sushi-grade fish. Thaw it in the fridge, never at room temperature, keep it cold until you cut it and eat it the same day. Pregnant women, small children, older people and anyone immunocompromised should choose the cooked version.
A version with no raw fish
Baked or hot-smoked salmon (cold-smoked salmon is still raw fish and not advised in pregnancy), prawns boiled 2 minutes and split lengthways, a thin omelette cut into strips, canned tuna mixed with mayonnaise, or vegetables alone: cucumber, avocado, carrot and pepper. The rice and rolling technique is identical.
When there is no rice vinegar
Cider vinegar diluted with water 4 : 1, with the same sugar and salt. The flavour is a shade fruitier, but the rice behaves the same way.
