Sushi Salad

 It's kind of weird that there are still food ideas out there that we've never heard of or imagined before. Down the road at the Colab Cafe they've been making sushi salad. What a brilliant idea! We love sushi but sometimes it's very ricey. So we've been experimenting with the flavours and textures in salad form- and have found it to be a brilliantly useful food. The basic salad lasts really well in the fridge and is very portable.

I'm not very good with plain white rice and since we always have a choice- last night I cooked a mix of red rice, brown basmati and wild rice. I like to put the rice in a pot during the day, pour water of it to a round 5 cms over the rice and let sit until later when I add a tsp of sea salt and simmer with the lid on for around 40 minutes and until the water is has been absorbed. 

Cool. Add ground black pepper.

So what else do you want to add to your sushi salad?

What do you have on hand and what do you love the most in sushi?

I've recently learnt that the light Asian pickle thing makes all the difference to raw veges so while the rice is cooling cut up a couple of carrots in to match sticks, peppers too if you like and then heat a 1/4 of cider vinegar to boiling point, add 1 tsp of salt and of sugar and pour over the cut up veges in a bowl. Give them a good toss together.  

Carrot sticks, any colour of capsicum, courgettes, cucumber, asparagus, snow peas and edamame are all great. The courgettes, asparagus and snow peas I slice finely and cook briefly before blanching. Drain well. Other things that work well are Yomogi- Japanese mugwort, mint, rocket, cress, coriander, nasturtium leaves and flowers. 

Then we added home made preserved ginger. It's so easy- learn how to make it just here.

And then a dressing: 

1/3 c of apple cider vinegar (or white rice wine vinegar if you prefer) add a dsp of honey or sugar and a little sea salt, lastly a dsp of soy sauce. Shake or mix together and pour over the salad. Mix it altogether- I use my hands.

That's the salad part. Next add things like nori cut in strips or pickled seaweed like Neptune's Necklace. Avocado makes a nice contrast to the other textures and flavours. We bought a small pierce of lovely salmon and cut it finely to make sashimi (remove any bones as you go) sprinkle with sea salt. Toasted sesame seeds white or black are a lovely too. The rest- make up as you go along. Wasabi if you like it.

So delicious and very satisfying.

Katie X