Sushi Cupcakes Recipe

This is a fun take on sushi! This fantastic technique allows you to exercise your creativity and create food that’s tasty, healthy and truly Instagram-worthy. Tag us in your photos with #sushicupcakes. We put hoisin sauce in the middle of our cupcakes, but you can add whatever you like. Wasabi and ginger is a great traditional filling.

Ingredients

400g sushi rice
30ml rice vinegar
25g caster sugar
½ tsp salt
12 nori sheets
6 tsp hoisin sauce
black sesame seeds, for sprinkling pickled ginger, to serve
soy sauce, to serve wasabi, to serve, optional

For the Vegetable Toppings

1 red pepper
1 carrot
¼ cucumber
1 small avocado
10 fresh chives
5 radishes

For the Dipping Sauce

sriracha
egg-free mayonnaise

Equipment

Small saucepan | Grease a baking tray with flavourless oil (such as vegetable or sunflower) | 14cm saucer | Ruler, optional | 12-hole (or 2 x 6-hole) muffin tin

Instructions:

1. Cook the sushi rice following the instructions on the packet, ensuring that it is dry and sticky when cooked.
2. Put the saucepan on a medium heat. Pour in the rice vinegar, sugar and salt and heat until the sugar has dissolved. Let cool to room temperature, then pour over the cooked rice, gently stirring until all the liquid is absorbed. Spread the rice over the greased baking tray and let cool to room temperature, when it should be dry but sticky.
3. Stack the nori sheets and lay the saucer on top. Cut around it to make nori circles. Find the centre of the nori stack and cut a neat, straight slit from the centre to the outer edges. Take one circle and fashion a cone that is roughly 8cm wide at the base. Wet your finger and lightly brush along the slit to stick it in place. Put the cone in one of the muffin holes. Repeat to fill all the muffin holes.
4. Wet your hands and roll a golf ball-sized ball of rice. Poke a hole in the centre and pour in ½ teaspoon hoisin sauce. Pack more rice over the hole to seal in the sauce. Smooth the outside and place in one of the nori muffin cases. Repeat to fill all the cases.
5. Get all your toppings ready. Cut the pepper in half, cut out the stems and seeds and thinly slice. Peel the carrot and cut into matchsticks, thin rounds or ribbons. Cut the cucumber, in the same way. Halve and carefully stone the avocado by tapping the stone firmly with the heel of a knife so that it lodges in the stone, then twist and remove, then finely slice. Chop the chives. Trim and thinly slice the radishes.
6. Make a quick dipping sauce by stirring sriracha into the egg-free mayonnaise to taste. Finely chop the pickled ginger.
7. Decorate your sushi cupcakes with the prepared vegetables and sprinkle them with black sesame seeds. Serve with soy sauce, wasabi, if using, pickled ginger and the dipping sauce on the side.

This is an extract from Bish Bash Bosh by Henry Firth and Ian Theasby (HQ Non Fiction, $39.99)