A really kid-friendly meal is Te Maki Zushi (literally “Hand Rolled Sushi”) or Roll Your Own Sushi. It’s a favourite of my nephews and many other kids (and adults!) who come to visit. We just lay a whole lot of fillings out in the middle of the table, put out a couple of big bowls of rice with several spoons, lots of Nori seaweed, soy sauce (or tamari) for dipping, wasabi for those who like a bit of “bite”. Dinner guests then take a sheet of Nori, put some rice on it, put the fillings they like on it, roughly roll it up, dip it and eat it!
Common fillings on our table are:
Japanese style omelet (eggs, soy sauce mirin – cooked into an omelet and cut into strips)
Long thin strips of vegies: e.g. Carrots, Cucumbers, Green Beans, Red Capsicum
Alfalfa sprouts
Tin Tuna
Raw salmon and/or tuna (except remember all fresh salmon in Oz is farmed)
Strips of chicken breast (boiled in water with soy sauce & mirin)
Avocado
Prawns
Other ideas: left over strips of roast beef, strips of tempeh
The trick for sticky rice is to use short or medium grain rice. For white rice: 2 cups of rice to 3 cups of water. For brown rice: 2 cups of brown rice to 4 cups of water.
Remember for digestibility, the rice should be soaked (especially in the case of brown rice).
[Today I did a quickie version of this for Taiji's lunch but I didn't have any rice so I quickly boiled up some green tea soba noodles to put in instead of rice. It's cheating in terms of indigestible grains but when you're on the fly, sometimes you don't have much choice. The nutritional upside was that he ate heaps of raw vegies that he wouldn't normally eat including lettuce!]
Eh voila!
