Sushi 5 - Some Kinds of Rolls

Today I'm going to talk about a few kinds of rolls made in the sushi bar. I unfortunately never had the chance to make any of these nor do I have photos of them. These special rolls required a higher skill level than I possessed to make them.

First, I want to mention the spider roll which is very interesting because it has a whole, deep-fried crab inside of it. It also has tobiko (flying fish roe), cucumber sticks, and avocado inside.
Another special roll is the crazy tuna roll. I like this one, though it's quite a spicy one. It's a shrimp tempura roll with spicy tuna on top, at which point a piece of plastic is laid on top, rerolled, and then cut into five pieces. Then, tempura flakes are liberally sprinkled on top along with more spicy and chilli sauce. After this, it's arranged on the serving platter in somewhat of a 'U' shape which is a very elegant presentation as well as providing a perfect place to put the greens, ginger, and wasabi.
The next roll I will mention is called the volcano roll. It has tuna, fluke, and salmon on the inside. What makes it interesting is that unlike every other roll we make, the volcano roll is shaped into a triangle. This is a bit reminiscent of what my partner and I did for our Garde Manger final. Ours did not come out as well, however. Oh, and the other reason this roll is called a volcano roll is due to the drop of chilli sauce poured onto each of this eight piece roll.
The last roll I'm going to talk about is the ninja roll. It's a rather special roll as well. First, the nori is put lengthwise. Tuna, avocado, and crab meat sticks are placed at the bottom. A piece of rice is smeared on at the top to act as something of a glue. Then it's rolled and has two broccoli crowns stuck into both ends before being sent downstairs to be deep-fried. This roll also has scallions and smelt roe. Once it's deep-fried, it's cut into nine pieces. Also, tempura flakes and chilli sauce are added. Normally, it's then garnished with daikon radish shreds, red cabbage, seaweed salad, and ginger, wasabi, and greens, of course.

This is only a short list of all of the rolls that were done on a somewhat daily basis. I think it's just amazing the ability to remember all of the different items, what's in them, and how to plate them. That must come with practice, I imagine.

Post 4 - Sushi

So, I wanted to show off what my work station at the sushi bar looked like. I worked on the right table and my chef Jack worked on the left. In the larger photo, you can see the bucket where the sushi rice was kept. The ginger and wasabi were between us, and we could see most of the restaurant from where we worked. The only thing not visible was the bar.

In the smaller photo were my tools of the trade. Of course, gloves were needed for sanitation and for keeping the rice from sticking to my hands. The knife was a special sushi knife loaned to me. Oddly enough, my chef choose to use a vegetable knife for cutting his rolls. Also pictured is the plastic wrapped bamboo mat.

Finally, we had our white clothes used to wipe down the work surface. When working with sushi, it's very important to have a damp work surface otherwise the nori or rice would stick to the board and snag when trying to cut it. The only exception would be if you had to cut a sheet of nori in half for when people ordered smaller roll sizes. Unless you do it on a dry surface it won't cut right and will snag and rip.