Plastic Sushi Mold VS Bamboo Rolling Mat.

I recently started to make sushi rolls again. They are easy to make and a great food to bring to the park. Sushi also fits well in my goal of reducing cooking without cooking oils, which is more healthy, and although I myself am not a health freak, when it comes to cooking for my 5 year old son, health certainly is a big issue.

(photo's) Sushi rolls rolled with a bamboo mat.

Rolls rolled with a bamboo mat allow for a jumbo filling and so taste and look great!

When I choose fillings, I pay attention to color, texture, shape, and bite, and the combination of them in one roll. When I made these rolls I especially had in mind that they should be attractive to non vegan people. So I used some of the fake meats available in the local vegan Jay restaurants, like a vegan version of a popular Isan sausage (middle, in combination with a juice triangular sized mango slice and crispy fresh lettuce) and vegan fish (photo middle and right).

The sushi roll on the left is a true vegan one, no  fake meats, it has fried tofu, cooked carrot, fried fresh shiitake mushrooms, and fresh lettuce. Yummy yummy!

I always in the past made sushi with a bamboo mat but at one time I did buy a fancy plastic mold to make sushi rolls.

Plastic molds are definitely more easy to use and they make a perfect round roll. But there is one big problem. If you put too much fillings in your roll, your roll won’t come out well. In order to prevent your roll from breaking up, you only can use not too much fillings.

Using a bamboo mat on the other hand, you can royally put fillings on the rice and roll your roll with excellent result.

Rolls from the Mold.

Middle. Roll with carrot, tofu, and shiitake mushroom Using molds limits the portion of fillings. Rolls look unattractive.

Left. Same as middle, has extra slice of cucumber. This particular roll took great effort to take out of the mold without breaking due to maximum load of filling. Despite that, it still looks rather dull and boring.Not good to convince the omnivores that vegan food is great!

Right. Other plastic molds (other than to make sushi rolls) are handy though. Certain molds make a perfect small sized rectangular shaped rice, traditionally made with your hands, that can be used to make GunKan sushi, like this one that has a corn/vegan mayonnaise topping.

Sushi’s are easy to make, delicious, healthy, open to a lot of creativity, are suitable for many occasions (e.g. takeout food, easy comfort food, or fancy party food), and most people including regular non veg people simply love sushi, (vegan sushi are in the top three Vegan Ambassador foods to dish out to non veg people!

Any serious vegan home cook should master the skill to prepare a perfect set of vegan sushi’s.