# How to make Garnished Sushi or Chirashi Zushi.



## Naoko (Aug 30, 2009)

Japanese Sushi recipes is called Garnished Sushi or Chirashi Zushi. This maybe kinda long to make, but the out come will be worth the wait. My kids had fun making this with me and the love eating it after we were done. 

Ingredients:

☆ sushi rice(vinegared rice), cooked with 2 cup rice

A: Thin Omelet:
☆ 2 eggs
☆ salt and pepper
☆ cooking oil

B: Shrimp:
☆ 6 shrimps
☆ 3 tbsp dashi stock
☆ water and salt
☆ 1 tbsp vinegar
☆ 1 tsp sugar
☆ 1 pinch salt

C: Shiitake mushroom:
☆ 4 dried shiitake mushroom
☆ 1/2 cup dashi stock
☆ 2 tbsp sugar
☆ 1 tbsp mirin
☆ 1 tbsp soy sauce

D: Gourd strip:
☆ 10g dried gourd strip
☆ water
☆ salt
☆ 1 cup dashi stock
☆ 3 tbsp sugar
☆ 2 tbsp soy sauce
☆ 2 tbsp mirin

E: Carrot:
☆ 1/2 carrot
☆ 1/2cup dashi stock
☆ 1 tsp sugar
☆ 1 tsp mirin

F: Lotus root:
☆ 40g lotus root
☆ 3 tbsp dashi stock
☆ 2 tbsp vinegar
☆ 1 tbsp sugar
☆ 1 pinch salt
☆ vinegar add water

G: Snow peas:
☆ 10 snow peas
☆ hot water
☆ salt

Direction:

1. Make the sushi rice.(vinegared rice)

2. Prepare to ingredient as follows.

A: Thin omelet
Beat the eggs, Add the salt to the beaten eggs. Coat a frying pan for rolled omelet thinly with cooking oil, pour in the beaten eggs, and paper thin omelet. When cool, fold and cut into julienne
strips.

B: Shrimps
Mix the stock, vinegar, sugar, and salt to make seasoning liquid. Devein the shrimps put just enough salt and water in a pot to cover the shrimps. Add simmer untile all the liquid is gone. When cool, shell the shrimps soak in the seasoing liquid and set aside.

C: Shiitake mushroom
Soak the dried shiitake mushroom in cold water to soften(about 30 min to 1 hour) and remove the stems put the dashi stock, sugar and shiitake mushroom into a small pan. and place over low heat for 7 min. Add the mirin and soy sauce, and simmer until the liquid is almost gone. When cool, cut the shiitake mushroom into 5 cm squares.

D: Kanpyo(Dried Gourd)
Rinse the dried gourd strip briefly in cold water, rub hard with salted hands and wash away the salt with cold water. Put the gourd strip and plenty of water in a pot and boil. When the gourd strip become soften, rinse in cold water. Put the dashi stock, sugar, and gourd strip in a pot and simmer over a low heat for about 8-10min Add the soy sauce and mirin and simmer until the liquid is almost gone. When cool, cut then into 1 cm lengths.

E: Carrot
Peel the carrot, and cut in half crosswise. Cut one half into about 3cm wide julienne strips, cut other one half into 5mm piece and stamp out into a flower shape. Put the dashi stock, sugar,
salt, mirin and both the carrot in a pot, and simmer over a low heat until the liquid is almost gone.

F: Renkon(Lotus Root)
Peel the lotus root, and slice thinly. Cut the slices into quarter-rounds. immerse them in vinegar-add water. Boil briefly, and while hot, soak in the seasoning liquid make of the dashi stock, vinegar, sugar, and salt. make sure that the lotus root is complentely subnerged in the liquid. Let stand until cool.

G: Snow peas
String the snow peas, boil briefly in boiling salted water and rinse in to cold water. Cut into half lengths.

3. When the sushi rice is cooled to body temperature, mix it with the parced sesame, shiitake mushroom, gourd strip, shreded carrot prepared, and put everything in to serving vessel scatter the egg threads, all over the rice, and decorate the surface colorfully with lotus root, shrimp, carrot flowers, snow peas, and toasted seaweed sheet.

There you have it, hope you enjoy making this. If any questions feel free to message me.
Naoko


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## bigdaddy3k (Aug 30, 2009)

I always turn to my wife and laugh when I read sushi directions because the first line is invariably "Make Sushi rice" with no further explaination. If you look the technique up it's pretty involved.

First prepare the rice...
How to cook Japanese rice - Japanese cooking

Then turn the just prepared rice into sushi rice...
Japanese Recipe - Sushi Rice - sushi recipe


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## GB (Aug 30, 2009)

bigdaddy3k said:


> I always turn to my wife and laugh when I read sushi directions because the first line is invariably "Make Sushi rice" with no further explaination. If you look the technique up it's pretty involved.


Not only that, but sushi IS rice. Many people who are not into food think sushi is raw fish, but we all know that is not the case. Sushi is the rice. the rice is the main ingredient. Everything else is just added flavor and texture, but the rice is what is important. I forget the actual numbers, but I think sushi chefs in Japan train for something like 10 years with the first 7 years learning nothing, but how to make the rice.


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## bigdaddy3k (Aug 30, 2009)

GB said:


> Not only that, but sushi IS rice. Many people who are not into food think sushi is raw fish, but we all know that is not the case. Sushi is the rice. the rice is the main ingredient. Everything else is just added flavor and texture, but the rice is what is important. I forget the actual numbers, but I think sushi chefs in Japan train for something like 10 years with the first 7 years learning nothing, but how to make the rice.


 

YES! I once sat in a very nice restaurant at the sushi bar with two very nice chefs. They had both gone to school over there. They politely let me know that they were not to be considered chefs as they had not gone the full run. 

They went on to tell me that regular cooking is like a jigsaw puzzle. If you do everything right and place the pieces just so then you make a good meal. But sushi is like a rubic's cube! 

There are degrees of correctness. I suggested that they must have all the colors correct as I loved their sushi. They politely corrected me and each insisted that they other was better than themselves but that the most they could claim was 3 sides complete. 

I was blown away by three side correct sushi. I cannot imagine what 6 side correct would be like!


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## GB (Aug 30, 2009)

bigdaddy3k said:


> They went on to tell me that regular cooking is like a jigsaw puzzle. If you do everything right and place the pieces just so then you make a good meal. But sushi is like a rubic's cube!


I love it!!!


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## bigdaddy3k (Aug 30, 2009)

I'm so embarassed! 
I totally forgot to thank Naoko for posting. I LOVE sushi, and up til this point I have not had the guts to try to make it. I have even bought all the tools I would need. Your specific ingredients will help me greatly!


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## spork (Aug 31, 2009)

GB said:


> ... sushi IS rice.



9 out of 10 sushi restaurants are just barely edible.  Sometimes, it's the quality of the raw fish.  Most of the time, it is just bad sushi rice.  And, usually, it's insufficient rice vinegar.  I've asked many chefs about this, and they all basically reply, "adapt to your customers, or close your store."  Most American/European palates aren't accustomed to vinegar (salad dressings don't count, neither does a splash in a long tomato simmer; it's perhaps unfortunately associated with rancid wine).  So, sushi restaurants survive and proliferate accordingly.

I doubt that it's true, but I've heard that a sushi chef's first year is spent learning how to stroke a paper fan.  Like an Egyptian slave.  How to cool down the cooked rice to room temp, how to evaporate the vinegar, how to coordinate the work with someone who is sprinkling & folding in his/her liquid mixture until the sushi rice is just right.  

"chirasu" = "to trash, or to scatter"  _chirashi zushi_ basically means that all your leftovers are game to try with sushi rice.  I personally think a mild "crunch" like cucumber or carrot helps a lot.  Have fun, bdaddy!


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## bigdaddy3k (Aug 31, 2009)

Oh I definitely like the crunch. Personally, I am a huge fan of sushi. I have a decent pallet and I can taste all the flavors both individually and in the blend to see what the recipe originator was trying to do. How amazing! The complexity is astounding!

And to think that this was thought up by fishermen in boats trying to stretch their dwindling food supply so they could stay out longer and catch more fish. 

I don't know how much truth there is to it but they say that the rice vinegar originally was a way to keep the prepared rice from going over on the long voyages.


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