Style Kitchen Masterclass

An Introduction to Sushi by GC Giancovich of Smoking

If you’ve ever fancied rolling out your bamboo mat and making your own sushi, then this masterclass is just the thing for you. Wanting to learn the basics, we dropped by to see local expert GC Giancovich, Executive Chef of the Smoking Lobster group, fresh from a morning of bass fishing off the Ventnor coast.

GC first learned his sushi techniques from experienced Pan-Asian chef Neil Witney (of London’s Ricker Restaurants) and has continued to teach himself year after year, refining and evolving his techniques along the way. Today, he’s showing us how to make a simple entry-level nigiri topped with raw sea bass as well as a slightly more skilful and complex uramaki roll, filled with slivers of raw tuna.

Basic Ingredients

Sushi rice

Sushi vinegar

Soy sauce

Wasabi paste

For the nigiri

Seabass, thinly sliced

Pickled chillies

For the uramaki

Tuna, thinly sliced

Sheets of nori seaweed

Toasted sesame seeds

Pickled ginger

Mayonnaise

Equipment

Bamboo sushi rolling mat

Tuna Uramaki with Pickled Ginger and Wasabi Mayo

1. First, follow steps 2 and 3 from the nigiri recipe to cook, cool and season your sushi rice.

2. Next, cover your bamboo rolling mat with cling film. Wetting your fingers with cold water, line the cling film with a thin layer of rice. Use a sheet of nori seaweed as a size guide - the rice will need to be as big as the sheet, with an extra half centimetre of rice on one side.

3. Place the nori sheet onto the rice, then add the filling of thin slices of raw tuna, pickled ginger, and wasabi mayo. We use wasabi oil and wasabi powder to make our mayo but to make things easy you can just whisk wasabi paste into normal mayonnaise for a similar effect.

4. Peel the edge of the cling film from the mat and roll the whole thing over towards the extra centimetre of rice that you left on one side of the nori. Once you’ve made a cylinder shape, take one end of the mat in each hand, raising it up so the sushi hangs in it like a sling, then roll the sushi backwards and forwards in the mat for a few seconds. That extra rice will fill in any gaps and ensure it all sticks together. There should be no join visible.

5. Once rolled, cut into discs one centimetre thick and then remove the cling film from each piece. Sprinkle over toasted sesame and tobiko (flying fish eggs) if you can get hold of them. Then serve with soy sauce, pickled ginger, and wasabi.

Whilst these ingredients might sound hard to find, most can be found in larger supermarkets and any fishmonger can cut the bass or tuna fillets into suitable slices. We use J&B Fisheries in Cowes. Similarly, the bamboo rolling mats aren’t too hard to track down; you can pick them up at Easy Weigh in Newport’s Pyle Street, for example.

If these recipes sound daunting, just get yourself some sushi rice and a sushi mat and practice making the shapes with any filling. There’s no need to use expensive ingredients, just start with spring onions or peppers. Maki rolls are also quite an easy style to begin with; you put the seaweed down first, then the rice inside, before rolling, for example.

To view the Sea Bass Nigiri with Pickled Chilli recipe Please visit: styleofwight.co.uk