Month: June 2007

I grew up with my mom making cha-shu. She would make a big batch for dinner one night and we would eat it with ramen, and then eat it in sandwiches the rest of the week. It wasn’t until I met Son that I ever heard it referred to by the Chinese name – char siu? Or something like that? The way Son says it sounds like sa-siew, so now I’m completely confused. Don’t blame me, I’m Japanese! Hehe maybe some of my Chinese readers can help me out here? Anyways, after making the beef teriyaki for the Banh Mi Sushi and being rather successful with one of my mom’s dishes, I decided to make another dish that I grew up with, and it turned out pretty good too! (Of course it wasn’t as good as mom’s… it’s never as good as mom’s!)

Now you may think I’m silly, but if you are in the mood to go see a movie, and an animated one at that, you should really go see Ratatouille. You know, the movie with the cooking rat! Hehe Son and I just got back from seeing it, and it was fantastic! Now if only I could cook like that… maybe someday! 😀

Makes 6 rolls, or 36-48 slices.

Ingredients

• 6 sheets nori
• 3 cups sumeshi
• 2 lbs boneless center cut pork loin
• 2 tbsp hoisin sauce
• 2 tbsp shoyu
• 1.5 tbsp rice wine (NOT rice vinegar!)
• 2.5 tbsp sugar
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 tbsp ketchup
• 1/5 tbsp minced garlic
• 1 avocado
• mayonnaise
• seasoning salt

Cooking Directions

1. Remove most of the fat and gristle from pork loin and discard.
2. Cut meat with grain into strips about 3 inches thick.
3. Combine hoisin sauce, shoyu, rice wine, sugar, salt, ketchup and garlic in a bowl.
4. Add meat. Coat well.
5. Marinate at least 4 hours, or overnight
6. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit.
7. Arrange the pork on a rack (I used a cookie cooling rack) in a roasting pan (or on a cookie sheet). If you want to reduce the mess, line the cookie sheet with foil and also put foil on the rack, using a knife to cut through the foil where the openings in the rack are so the juices and marinade can drip through onto the pan. It’s not guaranteed to be entirely mess free, but it should reduce the mess significantly.
8. Roast for 45 minutes or until the meat is cooked through and the outside is brown.
9. Cook sushi rice.
10. Slice a piece of the cooked meat into strips, about 1 inch thick.
11. Cut the avocado in half, discard the pit, slice into thin slices while still in the tough skin, then discard the skin.
12. Roll the sushi, using one cha-shu stick, a few avocado sticks and mayonnaise as your fillings.
13. Sprinkle with seasoning salt. Enjoy!

A few weeks ago, Son got some pineapple from his mom. We like to use random ingredients like that when we get them, (since we don’t get pineapple very often), so we decided to use it in some sushi. Yum yum yum! If you have some pineapple, definitely try this one. Sweet, salty and refreshing, it’s a little bite of paradise.

Today was the last day of classes for me (I only had class on Tuesdays and Thursdays this quarter), and in one of my classes we had a little party. I made sushi, and it was a hit! I made the California Roll, the Crunchy Shrimp Roll, and the Tuna Salad Sushi, and there wasn’t any sushi left at the end of the class! I was so happy. 🙂

Makes 6 rolls, or 36-48 slices.

Ingredients

• 6 sheets nori
• 3 cups sumeshi
• 8 pieces tempura shrimp
• 1 small pineapple
• 6 sticks green onion

Cooking Directions

1. Cook sushi rice.
2. Bake tempura shrimp as directed on the package. I used this tempura shrimp, but I’m sure other types, or even homemade tempura shrimp will work just fine. You can also fry the tempura shrimp if you choose, but baking it is healthier, and you can prepare other things (such as the sumeshi) while it’s baking.
3. Cut tails off the tempura shrimp.
4. Slice tempura shrimp in half lengthwise, set aside.
5. Slice the pineapple into 1″ x 1″ x 6″ pieces.
6. Wash the green onion, cut the long green stalks off of the white bulb-like things. Discard (or pickle) the white bulbs.
7. Roll the sushi, using one green onion stalk, a piece of pineapple, and 2 ½ slices of tempura shrimp as your fillings.
8. Serve with shoyu, wasabi, and ginger if desired. Enjoy!

A while back in the comments for the Tuna Salad Sushi, Tanit suggested using Siracha hot sauce in the Tuna Salad sushi. We finally got around to trying it, and although I’m not so fond of it (I’m not a big fan of spicy things, although I am beginning to be able to tolerate wasabi 😉 ), Son loved it! If you like spicy like Son likes spicy, definitely try it!

Today Son and I went and played tennis. 🙂 Now this might not seem like a big deal, but I haven’t really played since I took lessons when I was 8 or 9, while Son was on the tennis team both at his high school and at his undergraduate college!!! So of course, we were very unbalanced, with really bad me on one side, and really good him on the other. Thankfully he was really nice about it today (unlike other times, when he has accidentally kicked soccer balls into my stomach or hit me with a power serve in tennis!) and was helping me improve my technique so that I could hit the ball straight and make it in the court (rather than hitting it on an angle such that it goes flying high). He even taught me to do a proper (overhead) serve!! I have never been able to do those, and I was able to hit the ball today, although it never actually made it over the net when I did an overhead serve. Yes, I was really bad, and really weak. 😛 My arms hurt.

Makes 6 rolls, or 36-48 slices.