Rolling, rolling, rolling... Keep rice moist and joining...

For a successful roll, you merely need to:

1. Not use too much wasabi - wooowa - unless you need to really clear those sinuses.
2. Keep your rice the right consistency. Lannae Long recently went into much more detail on this than I do.
3. Make the roll thickness consistent the whole length of the roll.
4. Have fun with it - no need for perfection unless you want it - we're doing this at home for kicks. If you want to be a sushi chef, you will need more than my little blog posts on the topic.

We decided to do "California Rolls," but with a few personal alterations (like the addition of carrots because I need more vitamin A .

We sliced stuff up as thin as we could.

We coated our bamboo roller in plastic wrap to ease cleaning.

We moistened the Nari and patted down a layer of rice over about 2/3 of the area of the Nari - just the right consistency, carefully added a tiny amount of wasabi for flavor and carefully laid out the veggies and crab in neat rows.

After that, we rolled the stuff by putting a bit of extra vinegar water on the still exposed seaweed, carefully turning the rice filled part of the roll until the exposed seaweed meets, pulling back on the roller to really compact all the contents, and finishing the roll. Here is where people have the most trouble - the compacting part. You just can't compact a roll too much - the more compact, the prettier and better it will hold together. I usually ruin 1-2 rolls if I have not rolled in a long time because, guess what? I don't compact them enough.

Another key to success is a sharp knife for cutting the contents and the rolls into bite-sized pieces. Alas and alack, we are in a furnished rental in Houston and there is not a sharp knife to be had, so our pieces ended up a little "frayed" They still taste the same though...

We set the table, had a toast and began our meal. BTW - It was grrrreat! Thank you to Jim Kidwell who taught me to do this.

Part five is coming soon (Miso Soup, baby.)