New Painting

There is a new painting posted over at my art blog

BUT - I am going to be putting all my paintings on Etsy to sell. I highly recommend this site not only for buying artwork, but for buying custom clothes as well. Everything on etsy is HAND MADE by someone and in limited quantities so you know you're fuckin' awesome cuz no one has your shit, homes!

Anyway - the Etsy shop isn't set up yet. I plan to do that after the holidays (maybe before if I really really work on it.)

I'm also modding the HELL out of some Eloh skins and have been passing my mods out to noobs. Unfortunately they think I am kidding and not giving them a skin so they never put them on :(

Maybe I should just set up a shop of 100L modded skins of weirdness. Who knows. I know its taken me weeks to find just the perfect brush (and hardness) to do makeup. That shit blows ya'll. Seriously.

Oh GOD this is HILARIOUS

Holiday ... sushi?!

That's right. Yesterday the husband and I put up our badass Christmas tree and I made us sushi for dinner. Sushi doesn't mean 'raw fish' (for those that don't know) and doesn't even HAVE to contain any kind of seafood. As a matter of fact: the ever popular California Rolls don't contain any seafood at all. They have nori (seaweed wrapper), avocado, carrot and usually a tiny bit of wasabi or wasabi mayonnaise. I did use seafood however.

I thought for blogger's sake (and for a bit of my own good, really) that I would post how I made the sushi step by step. It isn't as easy as just using boil in the bag rice and saying "TADA!" I wish it were! Instead - you'll have to allow at least a half hour just for the rice and a good half hour or more for prepping your sushi stuffers. So all in all - though sushi is easy and fairly quick - there is a lot of prep time involved. Let's get started! (don't worry I'll blog about other crap later!)

First you'll need some rice vinegar. Will regular vinegar work? Probably! I haven't tried it - but I would think that vinegar is vinegar. I wouldn't use white vinegar though. And I definitely wouldn't use normal vinegar if you can get your hands on real rice vinegar! That would just be silly wouldn't it?

This is the exact bottle of rice vinegar I use. Pic taken in my messy kitchen while making sushi. Forgive the mess, please! This is a very common brand, by the way.

You will also need single grain rice. You can NOT use instant rice or 'boil in the bag' rice!!! The rice will not be sticky enough and each grain will CRUSH! In sushi - each grain is very visible inside(or outside depending how you prefer!) and the rice is very sticky. Instant, boil in the bag, and normal white rice are NOT suitable for sushi making. Don't do it, mkay?

So here's the exact rice I use. As far as I know - its pretty common.

And the other thing you'll need (besides things to put IN your sushi) is nori. Nori is dried seaweed. This is probably what makes people think of raw fish. Since its seaweed, it does have a fishy smell, but it does NOT have a fishy taste. As a matter of fact, it doesn't really taste at all. Its usually really dry and almost brittle when in the package, but when wrapped around your sushi its softer.

Again - same popular Orchids brand (just to show I didn't ONLY buy that rice vinegar because of the company name!)

So you will certainly need everything that has a picture! Now for the instructions:

Place 2 cups of rice into a plastic or glass bowl

(2 cups of rice makes enough sushi for 3 people - or 2 hungry people. Always better to have too much than too little!)

Cover with water

Swirl the rice/water around with your hand until the water is very cloudy.

Drain water and repeat until water is clear (usually about 3-4 times)

In a medium saucepan (make sure it has a lid!) place:

2 cups of washed rice

2 cups of water

Place lid on saucepan and bring to boil over medium heat

(if you haven't done any prep I recommend doing your prep work at this point)

Once boiling use a wooden or plastic spoon to stir the rice (NO METAL SPOONS)

Reduce heat to medium high and cook for another 5 minutes

Reduce heat once more, stir, and cook for another couple minutes

Be sure not to burn the rice - but be sure all the water is absorbed

Remove rice from heat (leaving lid on) and set aside for a 5 minutes

After rice has set - put into glass or plastic container while Rice Vinegar is prepped

Making up the Rice Vinegar:

4tbsp. Rice Vinegar

4tbsp. Sugar (I use white granulated sugar - as long as you don't use brown you should be ok)

2tbsp salt (I use sea salt - I'm sure it doesn't matter)

Place all the Rice Vinegar ingredients in a small saucepan over medium heat

Stir ingredients with wooden or plastic spoon

!!DO NOT BOIL!!

Heat/stir until all granules are dissolved

Finishing Up the Rice

Add the HOT Rice Vinegar mixture to the rice

Stir the Rice Vinegar Mixture into the rice with a choppy motion with your plastic or wooden spoon

Stir the Rice in the choppy motion until it is at room temperature (takes about 5-10 minutes)

My best advice at this point is to have a small bowl of water sitting nearby. This is to moisten your hands and knife to keep the sushi from sticking to you too badly. Its going to stick to you - no matter what - but the water keeps it under some kind of control.

So you place out a single sheet of nori. You cover the nori 85% with the sushi rice. Leave about a 1/4 inch gap at the top (this allows for a roll that doesn't look folded on one side. Perfect circle!) Once you have covered your nori - place your stuffing (I will put a list of things that I like to use inside sushi at the bottom) in the center of your rice. Just eye it - you'll find the perfect positioning once you've done this a few times.

Once you have all the things on the rice you wish to roll up in the sushi - grab the end nearest you and fold the nori (which includes the contents of your roll!) away from you until the piece you grabbed is now touching the edge of where the rice stops (this is why that 1/4 inch at the top is important!) Squeeze the sushi roll until it feels the seaweed will not come unwrapped and wet your knife.

From what I know - its traditional to serve sushi in two rows of 3 (equalling 6 lil sushi rolls) but I really don't see the point in being so traditional at home (unless you have guests - in which case be traditional and show off!) and you will probably mess up one or two if this is your first time - so no worries!!! Cut the roll in half and place the two halves side by side. Wet your knife again - and cut 3 times across the two halves which are side by side. You now have 6 sushi!!

Now you just stick them on a plate (stuffing side up) and serve! Not too hard I don't think. From start to finish it usually takes me about an hour to make sushi (using the 2 cup method I shared here) which is about how long it takes me to make dinner when I'm cooking something like spaghetti. This shows that making sushi (which is pretty darn healthy!) doesn't take any more time than anything else you're already doing. Its just something you aren't familiar with and only SEEMS like more work.

The first time IS a bit hectic - but the steps and instructions that I've put here are pretty much fail proof. There's almost NO WAY you can make bad sushi with the above 'recipe'! Promise! As you can see my rolls are FAR from perfect - but that doesn't effect the taste. The roll you see my husband holding has salmon and mayonnaise in it.

As you can see we aren't going for the whole traditional thing here at my house. We're even drinking a bottle of Andre (pink champagne haha!) with your sushi. I think we're also watching Top Gear or X Factor -- so really just make it your own.

I have to say though - it was really nice to sit back and relax and basque in the glory which is our badass Christmas tree. Our neighbors kept peeking through their window to see our tree - and people were slowing down outside to see our tree as they drove past.

I'm proud of my husband for not only caving and letting me have a WHITE tree - but letting me choose purple, hot pink and blue balls for it! Yay husband!

Now

Things you can put in sushi:

Salmon

lettuce

spinach (wilted in hot water)

avocado

carrot

ginger (pickled)

water chestnuts

sesame seeds

mayonnaise (NOT salad dressing!)

wasabi

wasabi mayonnaise

shrimp

crab

lobster

chicken/duck/goose/turkey (hey why not?!)

Honestly I think anything you can put on a sandwich can be put in sushi - but if you are going for traditional Japanese sushi - its best to use traditional items. I just prefer to have fun with my cooking is all!

EDIT: More pics of our weekend (my messy kitchen and more!) @ my Flikr