homemade sushi.

Something both extremely momentous and slightly dangerous happened on Friday night. 

My friends and I realized we could make our own sushi.

OMG, I know right?

For real though, I want to make this for myself at least thrice weekly for the rest of my days. Although the sushi-grade tuna was expensive and harder than we'd imagined to come by, the rest was pretty darn easy for how freaking delicious it all tasted.

So you're obviously dying to know how to recreate this in your own kitchen, right? 

I won't torture you any longer. 

The first step (I guess it doesn't have to be first, but it very well can be) in this glorious process is the arrangement of your accoutrements. 

Spicy mayo: an absolutely key and instrumental part of this operation. 

We couldn't find Japanese mayonnaise so we mixed Hellman's and Sriracha and damn, was it good. Maybe a little too good, as borderline-shameful quantities were consumed. But good, nonetheless. 

Do not make your own sushi without this stuff. 

Just don't.

Creamy, ripe avocado slices are another key player. Make sure that they're the perfect consistency, and make sure you've got a lot of them, too.

Chopped green onions are also pretty important, in my opinion. I love the kick of flavour and the slight crunch they add. I use them liberally in most asian-inspired dishes I make, and sushi was no exception.

We made (but didn't photograph) sushi rice, which differed slightly in preparation than your standard white rice with the addition of a rice vinegar and sugar mixture. There's a good article on how to make it here.

Molly also picked up - after much failed searching and scouring of our local grocery stores - some ridiculously awesome sushi-grade tuna from the specialty Toronto fish shop De La Mer on Bayview. Apparently it had been flown in from the Philippines that morning. Yup. We chopped it up and marinated it in sesame oil and some toasted sesame seeds.

Then came the fun part - the assemblage!

We didn't have bamboo sheets for making actual rolls, so we figured we'd make seaweed cone-style concoctions. 

Obviously, I got way too excited and over-loaded my seaweed sheets to the point where they could not be rolled into cones and instead had to be held like a precariously messy seaweed-taco of sorts. 

Others had varying levels of success with their cones, with me the definite loser in the cone-making category.

But no-matter, I say, because my overloaded sushi tacos were the bees knees.

 A note on tuna or any fish you choose to use: to keep the sushi vibe and go with raw, you gotta get good raw stuff in order for it to be a real treat. Whenever I've used frozen sushi-grade tuna, I've always washed it first to get rid of any fishy scent (which is a real buzz-kill in sushi). Our tuna was fresh, flavourful, and melt-in-your-mouth heavenly. The sesame marinade gave it a wonderful taste - highly recommended.

Overall, these rocked my world. In fact, by the end of the meal we found ourselves speculating that it was likely our best Girls' Night Feast yet. I also found myself, after a long first week in a new post-grad program (more on that later!) in a sushi and wine coma on the couch, while visions of messy-sushi-tacos danced in my head.

And those visions will continue to dance until I make this again.

Which will be very, very soon.

Do yourself a favour and follow suit!