Tekkamaki (鉄火巻き, tuna thin roll)

Ingredients

Equipment Needed

• •Makisu (bamboo rolling mat), or a clean kitchen towel wrapped around parchment as a stand-in
• •Hangiri (wooden sushi tub), or a wide nonreactive bowl
• •Rice paddle or flat spatula
• •Yanagiba, or a long sharp slicing knife
• •Small bowl for tezu hand water

Instructions

1. 1

   Wash the rice

   Put the rice in a bowl, cover with cold water, swirl with your fingers, and pour the cloudy water away. Repeat until the water is only faintly cloudy, then drain well for ten minutes. Rinsing takes off loose surface starch, so the finished grains cling to each other without turning pasty.

   Don't grind the rice between your hands. Broken grains make heavy sushi rice, and this roll has no sauce to hide it.
2. 2

   Cook the rice

   Combine the drained rice and 190ml water in a rice cooker and cook on the regular white-rice setting. For a pot, bring it to a boil covered, lower the heat to very low for 12 minutes, then rest off the heat for 10 minutes without lifting the lid. The rest finishes the center of each grain by its own heat, which is why impatient peeking gives you hard cores.

3. 3

   Season the rice

   Warm the rice vinegar, sugar, and salt just until dissolved. Turn the hot rice into a hangiri, the wooden sushi tub, or a wide nonreactive bowl. Sprinkle the vinegar mixture over it and fold with a rice paddle, cutting through the rice instead of mashing it, until the grains look glossy. Fan briefly and cover with a damp cloth until the rice is skin-warm.

   Hot rice drinks the seasoning. Hot rice also wilts nori and warms the tuna, so let it cool to the warmth of your hand before rolling.
4. 4

   Cut the tuna

   Keep the tuna chilled until the moment you cut it. Trim away sinew, then use a yanagiba or a long sharp knife to cut four straight bars about 1cm square and as long as the nori half sheet. Pull the knife in one clean stroke. Sawing roughens the cut face and makes the fish taste dull before it even reaches the rice.

   If your tuna pieces are short, overlap two ends neatly in the center of the roll. Don't mince scraps into the rice. Tekkamaki wants a line, not a secret.
5. 5

   Spread the rice

   Lay one half sheet of nori on the makisu, shiny side down, with the long edge running left to right. Wet your fingers lightly in the vinegar water and shake off the excess. Spread about 80g seasoned rice in a thin, even layer, leaving a bare strip about 1cm wide along the far edge. The rough side of the nori grips the rice, and the bare strip gives the roll somewhere to seal.

   Use less rice than your hand wants to use. If the grains are packed like plaster, the roll will split and the tuna will disappear.
6. 6

   Add tuna

   Smear a very thin line of wasabi across the center of the rice, then lay one tuna strip on top. Wasabi belongs against the fish, where it sharpens the clean sweetness of the akami. Use too much and you've stopped tasting tuna, which rather defeats the exercise.

7. 7

   Roll and seal

   Lift the near edge of the mat and carry the nori over the tuna, tucking the edge of the rice just beyond the filling. Pull the mat back so it doesn't roll inside, then press gently along the length to set the shape. Roll forward to close the bare strip of nori around the seam, and rest the roll seam-side down for 30 seconds. Firm enough to hold, gentle enough that the rice still has air between the grains.

8. 8

   Cut and serve

   Wet a sharp knife, wipe it clean, and cut the roll in half. Put the halves side by side and cut each into thirds, wiping the blade between cuts. A clean blade moves through rice and nori without dragging, so the tuna stays centered and the cut face stays neat. Set the six pieces cut-side up and serve at once with shōyu and gari.

Chef Tips

• •Ask the fishmonger one plain question: what came in today that you'd eat raw? A label that says sushi grade is not a law or a blessing. You want cold, clean-smelling akami with a wet sheen and no sourness.
• •Use lean tuna for tekkamaki. Toro is rich and beautiful, but this roll was built for the clean red line of akami, not for fat that softens the whole bite.
• •Open the nori only when you're ready to roll. If it has gone limp, warm it for a few seconds in a dry skillet. Crisp nori bites cleanly and seals better.
• •Keep the rice skin-warm and the tuna cold. Cold rice turns stiff and hard to spread; hot rice wilts the nori and treats good fish badly.
• •Dip lightly, fish side down, if you use soy sauce. Soaking the rice in shōyu makes the roll collapse and turns a clean dish into salt.

Advance Preparation

• •The sushi vinegar can be made a week ahead and kept covered at room temperature; stir before using so the salt is fully dissolved.
• •Cook and season the rice the day you serve. Hold it covered with a damp cloth at room temperature for up to 2 hours, but don't refrigerate it, or the grains harden.
• •Buy the tuna the day you serve it, keep it below 4 C, and cut it only when you're ready to roll. Do not use raw fish that smells sour, stale, or strongly fishy.
• •Roll tekkamaki just before serving. Ten minutes is fine; an hour is not. Nori softens quickly once it meets rice.

Frequently Asked Questions

Nutrition Information

1 serving (about 120g)