Making Homemade Sushi – How to Make Nigirizushi (Hand-Formed Sushi)
By CB Michaels
Nigirizushi (literally “hand-formed sushi”) is another of my favorite types of sushi. The combination of the flavorful sushi rice with the sensory experience afforded by the raw fish is truly inimitable. It’s also not very difficult to replicate at home and requires only the bare minimum of specialty ingredients, so for those of you who are creative or culinarily inclined this is my quick and easy guide to making your own nigirizushi at home.
Ingredients
Nigirizushi is simply raw fish on rice, and this is just about all you’ll need to make it. The rice must be prepared in the traditional sushi-style which takes approximately an hour, but once you’ve done that the rest is simple. Sushi rice requires a short-grained white rice, rice vinegar, salt and sugar. If you’re unfamiliar with the procedure for making it, I’ve written another article that describes the process in detail.
While I generally advocate the usability of standard supermarket fish in sushi, in the case of nigiri it is beneficial to invest in the higher quality “sushi grade” fish that you can buy at health food stores, Japanese markets and from some sushi bars. The reason I say this is that while all forms of sushi are truly an art form, the beauty of them isn’t so intrinsically reliant on the appearance and quality of the fish. With nigirizushi, the fish is cut in a specific manner, placed with great care and arranged in the a way that is visually appealing. And because there are no other flavors to disguise it, the taste is of the utmost importance.
Preparation
As I mentioned, the way that you cut the sashimi (raw fish) is also important. If you’re not planning on going all out, that’s fine; cut it any way you’re comfortable with. If you’d like to learn the correct procedure, that is another article altogether which I plan to write in the future (in the meantime, that too can be found on many websites.)
Once your sushi rice is prepared and the fish sliced into the appropriate-sized portions, everything else is quite simple.
Using the first two fingers of the right hand, simply scoop a small amount of sushi rice into the palm of the left, then squeeze and shape it into an oblong with the fingers and thumb. I usually have to squeeze quite tightly in order to get it to stay together. One you do, place the rice on a dampened surface (don’t let individual rice pads touch each other or they’ll stick) and spread a small amount of wasabi on top. Place a piece of cut sashimi on top, arrange all the pieces of nigirizushi artfully, and you’re done!
CB is a long time writer and internet content provider, most recently covering subjects such as Definitive Technology speakers and the best Definitive Technology subwoofer.
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