Recipe: Maki

I keep teaching friends and family how to make sushi, so here's my recipe.

You will need to get the following specialty ingredients to do it right:

* Japanese style rice (e.g. kokuho rose, or calrose)
* nori (squares of seaweed)
* mirin (a seasoning liquor)
* rice vinegar
* wasabi (green horseradish paste)
* pickled ginger (optional but good accompaniment)

You'll also need regular old:

* sugar
* sesame seeds (optional)
* soy sauce (preferrably tamari, but y'know... seriously...)
* veggies with a variety of textures; cucumbers, carrots, avocado, cooked yams, and soya-fried shitake mushrooms are a good start; we've had luck with fruits.)

Method:
1. For each guest, prepare a cup of rice with one cup plus two tablespoons of water. Bring the rice and water to a boil uncovered for two minutes, before covering and cooking on med.-low for 10 minutes. Remove from heat and let stand for 10 minutes more. Cool the rice; use a wide dish to do so quickly.

2. Meanwhile, for each cup of rice, dissolve 2 tbs. sugar and 1 tsp salt in 3 tbs. vinegar and 1 tbs. mirin. Stir the vinegar solution thoroughly into the rice.

3. Chop the veggies into long pieces; no thicker than a pencil is ideal, and thinner is okay. Also, take the nori and square by square drag the sheets across a med.-high electric burner (I don't know about you gas stove folks; you lucky bastards are on your own.)

3. On a kitchen towel or maki mat, scoop some rice onto a square of nori. Spread it around so that your rice is one layer deep, and leave a couple of centimeters of space at the top edge.

4. Line veggies a couple of centimeters from the bottom edge, no thicker than the small of your thumb. Sprinkle with sesame, and roll up to the top edge. If you stick each roll on a plate, top-edge down, as you work, the moisture will seal that bare strip of seaweed shut.

6. Cut each roll with the sharpest, thinnest knife you own, into reasonable sized hunks. Wetting the knife helps if you are like me and lack a proper kitchen sword. Serve with small dishes for soy sauce, pats of wasabi, and pickled ginger to refresh the palate between bites.

7. I'm a vegetarian. I don't know duck-sauce all about sashimi.