I have posted previously the basic recipe how to make maki sushi so I won’t re-post again but feel free to check it out. In any case, I wanted to try some new variations and they came out pretty neat. For example, I always made rolls that were with sushi nori on the outside. This time, I tried making the sushi with rice on the outside, some with black sesame seeds, some with avocado on the outside, some with smoked salmon etc.
They came out much  better than expected.

 I have to say I need sharper knives though. I really had a tough time slicing the avocado properly for the lineup on on top.

On a different note,I did finally get a bamboo mat so making sushi this time was a bit different. In my honest opinion, I had tougher time making the rolls as tight as I used to make them without the mat. I am thinking I will probably watch some more videos on how to do it with the mat. A lot of sushi chefs praise the use of the mat for rolling and I have the suspicion that I might be doing it wrong, that is why I am having a harder time rolling them with it.

Talking about new ingredients, I never used cream cheese in sushi before. I simply got one package and cut 2 stripes out of it, it looked almost as imitation crab. In combination with the salmon, it was amazingly delicious! Of course, one other reason to use cream cheese was that my little one doesn’t like fish and I needed to make something that she likes, so that pushed things in that direction as well.
In any case, sushi is much easier to make than most people thing and if you haven’t tried it before, I highly recommend doing it. It’s really interesting to test out all of the combinations one can make with 5-10 different ingredients.

For these sushi rolls I used :
– Smoked salmon
– Shrimp
– Crab rolls
– Cream cheese
– Cucumber
– Avocado
– Carrots
– White sesame seeds
– Black sesame seeds
– Sushi nori seaweed sheets
– Sushi rice
– Rice vinegar
– Sugar
– Salt

* I love sushi with raw fish, but I don’t use raw fish at home because I don’t trust the sources where I can buy it from. However, if you have a good supplier, by all means, include raw fish.  

As garnish I used ready made pickled ginger, sweet soy sauce dipping sauce, spicy mayo, wasabi. Most of these you can find in any big grocery store in the Asian food section.
Considering I made the traditional for many Japanese restaurants ginger salad and miso soup, the experience was much like going out to our favorite sushi place.

Enjoy!