Thinking—

Sushi is one of my favorite food in the world. I like eating it everyday, and as you may know, it cost a lot. Therefore, I decide to make my own Sushi roll. After observing how people make it and watching some Youtube video, I assume the process it’s very easy (just putting some rice, vegetable and meat in it, then roll it). I guess the material maybe hard to find, but it will only take a few minutes to make it.

Planning—

However, the truth is quite different from my imagination. First challenge I face is the meat. At first, I think that buying the frozen raw salmon from supermarket would work, but after I do some research. I find out that frozen raw salmon from supermarket can’t be used as the sushi ingredient. This is because it wasn’t fully removed the bacterials before frozen, so it must be cooked before eating. After knowing this, I drop my salmon plan. Then, I start searching for other meats. Suddenly, I have a brilliant idea: What about DIY an American style sushi roll, instead of only following the tradition? Then, I start thinking about what American eat most in their meals. After a while, I make a list of the ingredient options. My chosen candidates are: ham, fired eggs, jellyfish,cucumber,dried meat floss. I felt pretty satisfied with my choices, so I start go shopping.

Shopping —

I guess it will be difficult to find all the essential tools (Sushi mat, large flat seaweed, sushi rice vinegar and seasoning, etc.) for Sushi-making, but it’s lucky that I get them all just from one big Chinese supermarket in my neighborhood. After gathering all the tools, I start shopping for the ingredients.

Preparing Rice—

After carefully reading the instructions online, I wash the rice (1 cup = 3 rolls) with running water for 1-2 minutes until there is no more starch coming out of it. After wash, I take the rice and place it gently in a pot, add a little bit more water than rice ( the ratio is about 1.15:1 in favor of the water). Then, I use ½ cup of rice vinegar, 2 tablespoons of sugar and 2 teaspoons of salt. I mixe them together in a small bowl, then add it to the rice.

Making —

I put the pot of rice, and place all the essential tools and ingredient perfectly. Then, I start making. However, I got another challenge soon. The rice and the seaweed are not stick together perfectly as I imagine before. I start examining each step to figure out where I did wrong. Then, I find my answers. First, I shouldn’t put too much rice and ingredients on the seaweed. Even though the seaweed looks large, it can only hold about one line of ingredients and 1/2 rice on it, if I want to roll it perfectly. I must use the spoon to press the rice to flat on the seaweed also. It took me several practices to finally get how to control the amount and the position of the rice and ingredients. However, after my several practice, another problem pop up. The rice become cold, and when the rice get cold, the seaweed can’t stick the rice together. Therefore, I need to recook the rice, and repeat the boring rice preparing process again. In this time, I become smarter. I use a cloth to cover the rice pot, so the rice won’t get cold easily.

Finish —

Finally, I successfully make the Sushi I want, and I place them on a plate beautifully. Yay!

After this Sushi making experience, I’ve learned that making something new is actually difficult than what we imagine before making. This is because a lot of unexpected problems may came up, such as finding the prefect material, the tools, and some tricks to make things better. Besides, I’ve learned that making something new must take several practice. First time is always fail, but we can’t lost hope on it. We must keep calm and figure out which step we do wrong and try to figure out new ways to keep improving it. Overall, this is a fun experience, and I decide to make sushi everyday and bring to school as my lunch/dinner after it. 🙂

(P.S: This is for the extra credit assignment)