What is temaki?
Temaki-zushi means "hand-rolled sushi". At a sushi bar the chef rolls the cone in front of you and hands it across the counter. In Japanese families temaki is party food: rice, nori and a platter of fillings go on the table, and everyone rolls their own cones. For guests making sushi for the first time, it is the easiest way in.
The right ingredients
- Rice: Japanese short-grain rice, seasoned with rice vinegar, sugar and salt. The recipe for sushi rice describes washing, cooking and seasoning step by step. For temaki, let the rice cool to body temperature. Hot rice makes the nori soft.
- Nori: Cut whole sheets in half across to get rectangles of about 10 × 19 cm. You can find varieties and storage tips under nori.
- Fish: You eat salmon and tuna raw. Buy them from a fishmonger and ask for fish "for raw consumption" or "sushi grade", and cut it into strips about 1 cm thick and 7 cm long.
- Vegetables: Cucumber, avocado, scallions and radish sprouts. Remove the seeds from the cucumber, otherwise the rice gets wet.
How to roll temaki
Lay the half sheet of nori shiny side down on your left palm. With wet fingers, spread about 50 g of rice loosely over the left third. Lay the filling diagonally across the rice so the ends stick out over the top edge. Then fold the lower left corner over the filling and roll the sheet into a cone. A grain of rice at the end glues the cone shut.
Three ingredients per cone are enough. With more filling the nori tears open.
Fillings: salmon, California and Alaska
Temaki with salmon
Salmon with avocado and cucumber is the best-known filling. A few drops of lemon juice or toasted sesame seeds go well with it.
California temaki
The California filling comes from the USA: surimi sticks, which are imitation crab made from fish, with avocado, cucumber and Japanese mayonnaise. As a roll you know it as uramaki with the rice on the outside. You can stir up the right mayonnaise yourself with the recipe for Kewpie mayo.
Alaska temaki
On German sushi menus, Alaska usually means salmon with avocado, sometimes with cream cheese. Use 2 tsp cream cheese per cone, because more covers up the fish.
Without raw fish
For guests who avoid raw fish, cooked salmon, boiled shrimp or canned tuna with mayonnaise work well. For a vegetarian version, roll cucumber, avocado and pickled radish with sesame.
Common mistakes
- Too much rice: The cone will not close, and you mostly taste rice.
- Rolled ahead: The nori draws moisture from the rice and turns chewy after a few minutes. Roll each cone shortly before eating.
- Wet hands: Dripping water softens the nori. Dip your fingers in a bowl of water with a little rice vinegar and wipe them off on the rim.
Temaki as a party
Put the rice on the table in a bowl under a damp cloth, with nori next to it, a platter of fillings, soy sauce, wasabi and pickled ginger. The recipe card makes twelve cones, two per person. If temaki is the only main course, use more rice and nori. Hosomaki and nigiri fit the same evening, and you prepare the rice once for all types.
